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MY MOTHER’S 


MANUSCRIPT; 


BEING A TRUE PICTURE OF THE PRIVATE LIFE 
OF A FRENCH FAMILY DURING MANY OF 
THE MOST EVENTFUL PERIODS OF 
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. 


WITH ANNOTATIONS, PROLOGUES, AND EPILOGUES. 


BY 

ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE. 


TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH 
BY 

MARIA LOUISA HELPER. 


) 5 y 

) > 

( J ) 


PHILADELPHIA 



J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 

1877. 



4-cr 

I £ 


Copyright, 1876, by J. B. Lippincott & Co. 




DEDICATION 


TO 

MRS. EMILY BEACH POLK, 

FORMERLY OF ASHEVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA, 

NOW OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND, 

WIDOW OF CAPT. ALEXANDER HAMILTON POLK, 

IN WHOSE FAMILY, CONSISTING OF THEMSELVES AND THEIR FIVE 
CHILDREN, MORE THAN IN ANY OTHER FAMILY OF MY 
ACQUAINTANCE, I HAVE SEEN EXEMPLIFIED THE 
NATURAL NOBLENESS AND EXALTED VIR¬ 
TUES OF THE FAMILY OF MADAME 
ALICE DE LAMARTINE, AS 
HEREIN PORTRAYED, 

THIS BOOK, 

WITHOUT THE SLIGHTEST KNOWLEDGE ON HER PART, 

IS MOST AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED, 

IN THE HOPE AND TRUST THAT SHE WILL PARDON THE LIBERTY 
WHICH A SINCERE FRIEND, THE TRANSLATOR, HAS 
THUS TAKEN WITH HER GOOD NAME. 


M. L. H 




TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 


While on a visit, in 1873, to m y family and friends at 
Buenos Ayres, in the Argentine Republic, “ My Mother’s 
Manuscript,” which was then and there serially repub¬ 
lished in Spanish, in La Tribuna , one of the principal 
newspapers of the country, casually came into my hands; 
and having always been a great reader and admirer of the 
writings of Lamartine, I read this also, his last work, with 
an unusual degree of interest and pleasure. 

So deeply impressed was I with the exquisite simplicity 
and pathos of this new drama of domestic life in France, 
that I soon formed the purpose of translating it into Eng¬ 
lish; and this purpose remained steadily with me until 
after my return to the United States, where, in the city 
of New York, I found and purchased (what I had not 
been able to find in Buenos Ayres) a copy of the original 
work in French; and therefrom—and not from the Span¬ 
ish—has been educed the translation in hand. 

As a mere matter of fact (yet of small moment), I may 
here state, that I only predetermined to make this trans¬ 
lation in Buenos Ayres, began it in North Carolina, con¬ 
tinued it in New York, and finally, after -a long sojourn 
in New York, returned to North Carolina, and there 
finished it. The further fact that, with little else to do 
meanwhile, I have spent more than two years in trans¬ 
forming this little book from French into English, only 



6 


TRANS LA TOR’S PREFACE. 


proves what a very slow and, as I fear, imperfect worker 
I am. 

This dilatoriness of action on my part has not been 
without result, as affecting the work, in a far-distant land. 
Only a few weeks before my own translation was finished, 
I was surprised, and yet (considering the great interest 
and merit of the “Manuscript”) not surprised, to read a 
brief item in the literary department of a New York 
newspaper, stating that Madame Lamartine’s diary, as 
revised and edited by her son Alphonse, had already 
been translated into English by Lady Herbert, of Lon¬ 
don. That the original work in French should thus, at 
.one and the same time, elicit absolutely different and 
spontaneous translation into English in both Europe and 
America, gives indication of the very high estimation in 
which the book may, perhaps, at a future period, be held 
throughout the republic of letters. As yet I have not 
seen, whether in the simple form of quotation or other¬ 
wise, so much as one line, nor even so much as one 
word, of Lady Herbert’s translation ; but, because of my 
curiosity to examine her labor, which, judging from the 
generality of British precedents in matters of this kind, 
I dare say has been ably and worthily performed, I have 
made arrangements to obtain a copy of her book, only, 
however, after my own rendering of the original shall 
have come from the press. Influenced by this deter¬ 
mination, I have preserved, as I wished to preserve, the 
perfect independence, wholeness, and uniqueness of my 
own translation. 

At first I abandoned entirely the idea of rendering 
into English the poetic portions of the “Manuscript,” 
deeming it a task altogether too formidable and hazard¬ 
ous for one so unskilled as myself to undertake ; but after 
carefully considering the subject several times, and fear- 


TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 


7 


ing that the work might be conspicuously incomplete 
without them, I resolved that I would at least try to 
translate those portions into an acceptable sort of metri¬ 
cal and consonant sense. If I am guilty of any undue 
presumption in this regard, I heartily crave my readers’ 
pardon. Certain it is that my own poor faculties are too, 
dull and prosaic to reflect anything of the artistic touch, 
the flowing beauty, or the majestic grandeur of Lamar¬ 
tine’s lofty muse. The very most that I could hope to 
accomplish in this particular matter was to reproduce, 
with passable ingenuity, the golden links of harmony and 
significance which exist between the author’s incompara¬ 
ble prose on the one side and his sublime poetry on the 
other. In my efforts to maintain the natural and neces¬ 
sary connection between these two very different yet re¬ 
spectively perfect forms of expression by one of the great 
masters in modern literature,—a man equally able and 
distinguished, whether as a frequenter of the Academy or 
as a visitor at Helicon,—I may frankly admit that I did 
the best I knew how to do, and that having so done, I 
could do no more. 

If, as is but too probable, I have not succeeded in ren¬ 
dering the obvious and impressive facts of this book more 
cheerful and interesting than the very best of the works 
of modern fiction, and more hopeful and elevating in tone 
than many of the distinctively moral dissertations of the 
times, it was and is only because of my sheer inability to 
do justice to the original. 

Yet this I may avow, with all candor, that while, even 
for this world, I have not been unmindful of the sacred¬ 
ness of my obligation to make strenuous efforts to pre¬ 
serve, as fully as possible, the original brilliance and 
purity of this French gem of perfect literature, neither 
have I ceased to be profoundly imbued with the thought 


8 


TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE. 


that, after the present life, a future may come when, for 
the manner of my translation of the work, primarily so 
well fitted to influence in mankind a more generous and 
noble order of opinions and actions within the family cir¬ 
cle, I may be held to account, both by the Great Spirit 
of Him who is always the Sum of All in All, and by the 
immeasurably less potent spirits of the Lamartines them¬ 
selves, mother and son, who first wrote, and wrote so 
well, in another language, the hallowed pages of this 
“ Manuscript/’ 

If the work, in the English garb in which I thus have 
the pleasure of presenting it to the world, shall prove to 
only so many as two or three of my readers half so fas¬ 
cinating and gratifying as the Spanish and the French 
editions of the same work have proved to me, I shall 
always feel fully justified and rewarded for my interme¬ 
diacy herein, which, from the very first, has been with 
me a self-imposed labor of both love and duty. 

M. L. H. 

Asheville, North Carolina, September 21,1876. 


RONCHAUD'S PREFACE TO THE FIRST 
FRENCH EDITION. 


To two minds and two hearts is due the authorship 
of this book. The financial distress and ruin which so 
sorely afflicted the closing days of Lamartine, had com¬ 
pelled him to sell the precious manuscript drawn from 
the ancient records of his family, enlarged and embel¬ 
lished by his own commentaries, as a filial tribute to a 
sacred memory. The publication of the work was even 
announced during his lifetime; but, at his own special 
and urgent request, it was deferred. Bought and reserved 
by the publishers of his posthumous works, the book can 
now properly appear; the son having gone to rejoin his 
mother in the tomb; and a profound and universal re¬ 
spect having been awakened in connection with the least 
recollection of the great genius who has thus descended 
to posterity. This work, the “ Manuscript of my 
Mother,” forms, with the unpublished “ Memoirs,” the 
last link in the narrative of his life, which Lamartine 
himself has prepared. It contains the sweetly romantic 
incidents, of his childhood and youth, so much the more 
precious as they are authentic, having for witness the 
very mother herself of the poet, a woman truly worthy 
and noble, who had faithfully transcribed them in a jour¬ 
nal, wherein it was her custom to tell to herself anew the 
daily events of her domestic hearth. 

A* 


9 



IO 


RONCHAUD'S PREFACE. 


Since the acquisition of the manuscript by the proprie¬ 
tors who now publish it, its appearance has been retarded 
by the late appalling events which have filled France with 
desolation. Now that the return to peace and order per¬ 
mits us to come back at last to the pure joys of literature, 
the moment seems opportune to recall public attention to 
the beautiful and elevating writings of Lamartine. After 
so many severe trials and so many painful humiliations, it 
is necessary for France to reinvigorate herself with the 
reading and the study of her great authors; to recount 
her glories, and to behold her genius shining once more 
in those who have carried highest and furthest her sym¬ 
pathetic brilliance and splendor. Of those authors La¬ 
martine is universally and justly acknowledged to be one 
of the greatest. 

In less troubled and less unhappy times, although him¬ 
self saddened also by the remembrance of revolutions 
and wars, he gave out, for the first time, his songs of 
love, of sympathy, and of hope. Is it not a singular 
predestination which brings out of the tomb to-day, and 
resounds through so many ruins, a last and more melan¬ 
choly outburst of his pure and religious poetry? 

The reappearance at this time of the name of Lamar¬ 
tine is entitled to another welcome. Although politics 
are absent from this book, yet it will not the less recall 
to mind the Great Republican of 1848; the man who, 
during a revolutionary crisis, bravely recommended to 
France a republican form of government as her safest 
refuge against the recurrence of internal strife. The 
republic of which he had conceived the idea, and of 
which his name has remained the symbol, the true repub¬ 
lic, great, open, and generous, protecting all vested rights 
and legitimate interests, is the very republic which France 
is now again endeavoring to establish; for it alone can, 


RONCHAUD'S PREFACE. 


H 


at one and the same time, preserve France from the vio¬ 
lence of desperate demagogues and from the tendencies 
toward a blind and fatal reaction. 

Seated in the ranks of the National Assembly, more 
than one disciple of Lamartine is now striving to main¬ 
tain in France the republican form of government, and to 
develop to the best advantage the true republican idea. 
May the genius of their worthy and eminent master look 
down upon them, and upon all those who, with a devoted 
heart and with a strong and faithful hope and purpose, 
are engaged in the same noble work ! 

In an ode to Lamartine, an American poet has ex¬ 
pressed the opinion that, although the Republic of 1848 
was only the hastily-sketched outline of a system of gov¬ 
ernment, yet it was the most beautiful work of the poet, 
as the most beautiful work of Michael Angelo was his 
unfinished bust of Brutus. If, as is to be sincerely hoped, 
the interrupted work shall be resumed and successfully 
terminated by other hands; if full and perfect liberty 
shall indeed be established in France, upon a solid and 
enduring basis; then the name written on the first page 
of this book ought certainly to be the first engraved, and 
the boldest in relief, on the pedestal of the statue of the 
French Republic. 

LOUIS DE RONCHAUD. 

Paris, July 8,1871. 

















-V 






























































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LAMARTINE'S OWN ADVERTISEMENT 
TO THE READER. 


An entirely domestic circumstance, which it is use¬ 
less to disclose to the public, has finally resulted in the 
giving of this little manuscript to the press. Both by 
its nature and by intention it was expected that it would 
forever remain a manuscript. It should at most have 
constituted a part of those sacred family records which 
the children, the grandchildren, the nephews and the 
nieces, find sometimes in the dusty drawer of some old 
piece of furniture in the country, and which they peruse 
for their own interest and edification during their long 
leisure in the holidays of autumn. 

Yet, since the work has escaped from the domestic 
hearth, in spite of us, and is destined (with whatever re¬ 
luctance on our part) to come before indifferent eyes and 
distant minds, we here dedicate it only to the family 
of that beautiful and affectionate mother who, in these 
pages, poured out the fullness of her heart, without fore¬ 
seeing that she would not have time to secrete or destroy 
the pious pencilings of her home life. We beg that others 
will not attempt to read it, for they will probably find 
nothing here of what they are most apt to look for in a 
-book; the manuscript itself being especially interesting 
only for those to whom this virtuous woman has trans¬ 
mitted either a drop of her blood or otherwise a kinship 

*3 


2 




14 


LAMAR TINE'S OIVN AD VER TISEMENT. 


of her soul. Let us here add to our limited company of 
natural privilege some few friends who still live in ‘the 
country where she resided; some old servants who only 
pronounce her name, weeping at the happy recollection 
of it ; and some peasants of the neighboring cottages, 
who frequently come down the mountain on pilgrimages 
and on days of prayer, and whose footsteps for twenty- 
eight years have prevented the grass from growing over 
the path which leads to her tear-moistened grave. 

ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE. 


Saint Point, November 2, 1858. 


MY MOTHER’S MANUSCRIPT. 


I. 

Throughout the rural districts of France the second 
of November is a day that is generally designated as 
The Day of the Dead. When I have sufficient leisure, 
I pass this day in solemn meditation at Saint Point, 
as near as possible to the little cemetery of the village, 
upon which opens a small private door of my garden. 

Tfc|re, just there, lies in the earth, which she loved so 
well, my precious mother, whose coffin rests affectionately 
beside another coffin, smaller than hers, which she seems 
to have drawn along with her, as the bed that gives way 
above may crush down the cradle beneath it. From that 
coffin my imagination does not even dare to lift the 
shroud, lest I should see again on earth that which, being 
lifeless here, I desire to see hereafter only in heaven. 


II. 

During this short and chilly day of autumn, I endeavor 
not to allow my thoughts to be diverted by any frivolous 
intercourse with the living from the sad and silent com¬ 
munion of my soul with the souls of those who are now 
no more in the flesh. I delight in wandering along the 
most gloomy paths of the woods, which still have a suf¬ 
ficient quantity of discolored leaves to intercept the pale 
rays of the sun; whilst here and there the faded and 
wilted foliage falls to the ground, signifying to us that all 

i5 



i6 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


living creatures are breathing death, and that, in verity, 
every terrestrial thing not dead must die. Outward Na¬ 
ture, in this month, is but a vast elegy which associates 
itself harmoniously with the eternal elegy- of the heart of 
man. 

I go, I come, I linger upon the wet grass, without any 
object but merely to go over and about the footsteps of 
dear and departed ones, who, in other days, would gently 
walk before me, behind me, or by my side, in these very 
by-paths. Unconsciously I stop every few moments, and, 
half transfixed in contemplation, my feet seem to become 
buried in the soil near the great isolated trees of the 
border of the woods, at the edge of which, either by 
chance or by habit, the older and the younger people 
used to meet together,—the mothers, the children^ the 
uncles, the aunts, the nieces, the nephews, and the inti¬ 
mate friends of the family. Even yet do I seem to hear 
their mingling and melodious voices, grave or gay, amid 
the murmuring of the sometimes dull and sometimes 
merry rippling of the neighboring stream. Alas, they 
have risen forever from the trunks and roots of those 
trees, where they would sit in the beautiful mornings and 
evenings of September; but they have left behind them 
such enchanting impressions of memory, that I am fre¬ 
quently inclined to think that they have only wandered a 
few steps away, or that I have mistaken the tree or the 
glade which would guide me to join them again, and that 
I am, indeed, certainly going to see them and hear them 
once more at the very next turn of the footpath. 

iii. 

There, very near by me, is one of the particular places 
where my eyes never tire of looking earnestly for those 
who will never more come to meet me. It is only a few 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


17 


hundred steps from the house. To get there one has to 
follow a narrow road, over which the cattle go to graze, 
fringed with two hedges of thorn-bushes, through a large 
field covered with rocks, and a sloping meadow, where 
groups of oxen chew their cuds, and whose white and 
red marble-resembling flanks, flushed with fat, reflect the 
bright and glittering rays of a summer sun. This road, 
without either shade or grass, makes one long for the cool 
and shady vault of the woods, which may be seen waving 
under the breeze on the side of the mountain, near the 
boundary of the field and meadow. 

At last one glides into a cooler place, all panting for 
breath, under the first screen of aspen-trees and alder- 
bushes, which grow on the margin of the meadow, where 
the oozings of the little fens and quagmires of the hills 
quench the thirst of their roots. There we breathe the 
humid moisture of a meadow stream. Soon the alders 
disappear, as the rocky soil becomes high and warm ; then 
come in view the old trunks of the yoke-elms, hollowed 
like hives; the great beech-trees, whose bark is speckled 
like a fleece of gilded moss; the chestnut-trees, with their 
branches extended like the cedar, and which, with their 
sharp-pointed leaves, like lance-heads, decorate the en¬ 
tire length of the road. This road is suddenly terminated 
by a rough and precipitous declivity, which, however, is 
so situated as to be equally favored with all the dazzling 
light and heat of a bright summer sky. Here, indeed, is 
a very hollow and deep-cut valley, with an abrupt descent, 
which on one side plunges its disintegrations into the 
darkness of the forest, and on the other gradually spreads 
out into the well-cultivated fields and grassy meadows of 
the fertile lowlands. 

The common grass of this locality, grazed with so much 
avidity by the goats and sheep, grows fine and yellow, 

2* 


i8 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


like those rare downs and lichens which, blown and sown 
by the winds, vegetate on the almost barren rocks of the 
escarpments of the Alps. 

The field-flowers here do not rise higher than the shorn 
and outspread fleece of a sheep; in fact, one must some¬ 
times stoop down to see them well; but their fragrance is 
delicious; and when you pick them, and lay them on the 
palm of your hand to examine their tissues, their corollas, 
their stamens, and their colors in miniature, you will per¬ 
ceive that Providence has taken as much pains with these 
minute and almost imperceptible germinations as with 
the most gigantic vegetables of our hot-houses or of our 
forests. The busy bees, the beautiful butterflies, the bril¬ 
liant humming-birds, and the numerous winged insects 
without name, love these flowers, suck them in the sun, 
delight in the perfumed and genial warmth of the soil, 
and fill with happy music the valley of this little southern 
plain; merrily chasing one another in mock combat, and 
rapidly flying and buzzing hither and thither in the full 
joyousness of life. 


iv. 

Upon the hill opposite the road, cut off by this rugged 
opening in the earth, forty-five old oaks, spared for cen¬ 
turies by the wood-chopper, are scattered in disorder, and 
at considerable distances from one another, at the edge of 
the ravine. White, violet, and rose-colored heaths cover 
like an elegant carpet, as varied and velvety as the wool of 
Smyrna, the half-shaded spaces between the trees. The 
tops of these trees, beaten and bent for so many years 
by southerly winds, are half bald ; their lower branches, 
especially those of the middle clump, are becoming black, 
and give other unmistakable evidences of saplessness and 
decay. Only a few small tufts of yellowish leaves dangle 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


x 9 


from these limbs, and fall from time to time, forced from 
their twigs by the gusts of the equinoctial winds, with a 
husky and sudden noise, which causes the timid jays and 
blackbirds to fly away with fright. 

Upon the border which overlooks the ravine, the seven 
oaks which form the front of the grove hang their wide- 
outstretched arms over sound and vigorous trunks, and 
show themselves to be the strongest and grandest old men 
of their race. Their more leafy tops do not permit us to 
see any of those black arrows, those slender and lifeless 
limblets, upon which the thrushes delight to dwell, and 
which serve as retreats and observatories for so many other 
kinds of birds. These trees extend their branches ma¬ 
jestically over the slope of the valley, and their roots, 
almost on a level with the surface of the ground, cause 
the grass and the moss which cover them to swell with 
kindred and magnetic growth. 


v. 

It is at the foot of the largest of these oaks, the one 
nearest to the dense forest, that I used to light bonfires in 
my childhood; and the smoke-stains and cinders, though 
washed by the copious rains of so many winters, still blacken 
and deaden its rough bark. It is there that, later in youth 
and in early manhood, I have written with pencil so many 
poetical melodies, which came as lightly and merrily 
to my imagination as the warm breezes of spring came 
genially through the branches of the trees over my head, 
making them resound with sweet harmony. It is there 
that, in happier and still more lengthened days, we would 
sometimes come with the old people, and with the cradles 
of the family, to pass the warm hours of the afternoon, as 
we would otherwise do in a commodious and delightful 
drawing-room. 


20 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Nothing was there lacking of the natural stock of fur¬ 
niture requisite for a spot of repose and delight; neither 
the rustic pillars formed by the forty-five oaks standing 
erect over the grass-plot; nor the green canopies of leaves 
set in motion by the circulating breeze of the neighboring 
woods; nor the varied music of the lark and the nightin¬ 
gale perched and singing near the nests over which their 
mothers brooded; nor the soft cushions of dry moss grow¬ 
ing from the roots and trunks of the trees; nor the musical 
drippings of the drains of the hill-side filtering through 
the clusters of little bushes of a darker and more lustrous 
green in the lower meadow; nor, finally, the dreamy 
smokiness of the distant mountains, which resemble so 
greatly those of Greece, and which are seen under the 
branches of the taller trees, like a picture through the 
open windows, draped with gorgeous and wavy curtains. 


VI. 

A perspective of that sweet place and that lovely time 
spreads itself out before both my eyes and my heart as I 
behold again the half-leafless branches of the oak-grove, 
which has now become tinged with yellow under the last 
rays of the summer sun. 

Upon the roots of one of the oldest and most bended 
trees which form the boundary of the forest an aged 
woman, bowed down by her years, like the tree itself, is 
seated; her trembling hands spinning at a distaff filled 
with wool whose fibres are not whiter than her own hair. 
She exchanges, from time to time, with a young attend¬ 
ant, a few words in a foreign language. Her physiog¬ 
nomy has the placid appearance of the peace of a finished 
life which expects its reward in heaven, but which is 
born again upon the earth, in other and later generations, 
under her own eyes. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


21 


Another woman, in the sound and plump maturity 
of age, holds in her hand a half-closed book, which she 
opens and shuts at intervals, and occasionally reads a pas¬ 
sage therein. Soon she closes it entirely, and uncon¬ 
sciously presses it between her two hands, as if earnestly 
and sincerely reflecting upon what she has read. One 
can see, by the serious fixedness of her features, that the 
book entertains her with the solemnity of eternal things. 
Her pious meditations lower, from time to time, her long 
and transparent eyelids; then she lifts up toward heaven 
the pensive globes of her black eyes. Her sedate and 
ascetic face is pale, and one can see in it the delicate 
lines of an exquisite moral beauty. It is the veil of a 
soul rather than the visage of a body; but the habit of a 
sweet and tender smile softens its austerity even in prayer. 
She turns her eyes, dazzling with celestial light, upon 
everything that surrounds her; and when, finally, they 
fall upon me, they linger there as agents of the purest 
gentleness and love. One can readily see that it is a 
saintly mother who joyfully contemplates the happiness 
of her son. 


VII. 

Lower down upon the grass-plot, here in shadow, and 
there in sunshine, a young lady with golden hair and blue 
eyes, and whose slender and graceful figure resembles one 
of the Nymphs of Ocean, is, with crayon and paper upon 
her knees, drawing sketches. She reproduces on paper 
a part of the beautiful scene before us, enlivened by the 
accidents of light and shade, by the smoke of the cot¬ 
tages, and by the goats frisking upon the rocks. At each 
stroke of the pencil she is interrupted by the happy ex¬ 
clamations of a beautiful and charming little child of 
about four years of age. This child becomes enraptured 


22 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


on discovering in the moss a tiny buttercup, which she 
eagerly plucks for her mother. She brings her harvests 
in handfuls, and throwing them pell-mell upon the pic¬ 
ture-page, receives an audible and affectionate kiss in 
recompense. Again she goes running toward the moss- 
plot, and when she stops and kneels upon the grass, to 
catch a winged insect within the calyx of a flower, she 
disappears almost entirely, as if covered by a veil, under 
her golden and disheveled hair, brightly gilded by the 
light of a perfect day. One might more readily imagine, 
in place of her, one of those curiously wound skeins of 
gold-colored silk which the washers of the cocoons hang 
on the hedges of the meadows to dry in the sun. 

In the half shade of the background of the oak-grove 
a young man observes, at a distance, this scene of domes¬ 
tic life in the country. He walks, with uneven steps, 
from one tree to another; the moss deadens the sound 
of his footsteps; he holds in one of his hands a book, 
whose pages are blank; at intervals he stops to write 
down, with pencil, a few lines. 

Here is what I wrote that day. Alas, how little did 
I then suspect that these verses would so soon turn to 
tears ! 


THOUGHTS ON THE DEAD. 

Here are leaves without sap, 

Which fall upon the grass; 

There is the wind which rises 
And moans in the valley; 

Here is the wandering swallow 
Which grazes with the tip of its wing 
The sleeping waters of the swanjp; 
There is the child of the cottage, 

Who gleans upon the heath 
The boughs fallen from their trunks. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


2 3 


No longer do the billows murmur 
With the song which enchanted the woods; 
Under the branches without verdure 
The birds are heard no more. 

The night will soon follow the twilight; 
Scarcely have the stars begun to shine 
In the paths of their measureless orbits; 

At intervals they throw 
A pale glimmering light 
Not wholly unlike the day. 

The ewe upon the hills 
Finds no more the grass-plot; 

Her lamb leaves in the thorns 
The loose fibres of its fleece. 

The goldfinch, bird of sweet music, 

Rejoices the beech-tree no longer 
With its airs of joy or of love. 

All the grass in the meadow is mowed. 

This is the way in which the year ends; 
And thus too are ended our days! 

It is the season when everything falls 
By the augmented gusts of October. 

A blast-wind which comes from the tomb 
Likewise the living cuts down ; 

They fall then by thousands, 

Like the superfluous feathers 
Which the eagle shakes off to the air 
At a time when the new plumage 
Comes again to warm its strong wing, 

At the chilly approach of December. 

Then was it that my eyes beheld 
So many dear ones grow pale and die; 
Tender fruits they were to the light, 

But God would not let them get ripe! 
Although myself young on the earth, 

I am already left quite alone 
Amidst relics of friends now no more; 

And when of myself I ask, sadly, 

“ Where are those whom my heart loves?" 

I look fixedly down on the grass. 


24 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


The cradle has just been bereft 
Of a child whom malevolent death 
Cruelly cast down from the breast 
Into the black bed of the grave; 

All those, in fact, whose fast-ebbing lives 
Have, in their time, taken flight far away, 

And carried off with them some atoms of us, 

Are now whispering under the earth, 

“ You who still enjoy the sight of light, 

Do you yet remember us?” 

Where are they ? What orbs cast upon them 
More abiding or more resplendent days? 

Do they inhabit those upper isles of light ? 

Or do they now hover between heaven and earth? 

Are they drowned in the ethereal depths? 

Have they lost the loved names they bore here below ? 

The dear names of sister, sweetheart, and wife? 

To these affectionate calls will they nevermore answer ? 

No, no, my God! If celestial glory 

Had from them taken all human remembrance, 

Thou wouldst also from our own memories have taken them ; 
Our sighs and our tears for them,—are all these in vain ? 

Ah, let their souls in Thy bosom find rest! 

Yet retain us our places in their hearts. 

They who of old did partake of our joys, 

Can we be truly blest without their happiness ? 


Over them extend Thy merciful hand! 

They, as we, have sinned; but heaven is a gift! 
They have suffered; and that purifies ! 

They have loved; that is the seal of pardon ! 


They were the same as we are,— 
Dust, the sport of the winds; 
Fragile, like all mankind ; 

Weak, like nothingness. 

If their feet often slipped, 

If their lips did transgress 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


25 


( 


Any part of Thy law, 

O Father! O Judge Supreme! 

Do not look on them as men, 

But in them see only Thyself! 

If Thou deignest to examine the dust, 

Off from before Thy breath it will fly; 

If Thou touchest the light, 

It will tarnish Thy fingers; 

If Thine eye divine doth test 
The columns of this world, 

Under the heavens they will quake; 

If Thou sayest to Innocence, 

“ Come up and plead in my presence 1” 
Thine own virtues will be veiled. 

But Thou, O Lord, Thou possessest 
Thine own immortality; 

All the happiness Thou givest to others 
Only increaseth Thy bliss and perfection! 
Thou tellest the sun to give light, 

And the day gildeth space everywhere! 
Thou commandest time to bring forth, 
And eternity, submissive to Thee, 

Throws off the centuries by thousands, 
Scattering them without keeping account! 

Worlds which Thou dost repair, 

Before Thee grow young again ; 

And never dost Thou separate 
The Past from the Future. 

Thou livest! and Thou livest! The ages 
Which are unequal by Thy works, 

Are yet all equal under Thy hand; 

And never doth Thy voice accent, 

Alas, these three words of man: 
Yesterday, To-day, To-morrow! 

O Father of Nature ! 

Source and Fountain of all Goodness, 

3 


B 


26 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


Naught can be compared to Thee; 

Forever art Thou supremely incomparable! 
Put, O Divine Mercy, 

Put Thy weight in the balance, 

If, indeed, Thou wilt with nothingness weigh 1 
Triumph, O Pre-Eminent Virtue, 

Whilst Thou contemplatest Thy function, 
Triumph forever in forgiving us all 1 


VIII. 

When the day declines, I go back into the house at a 
slow pace. There I shut myself up in the high-vaulted 
little chamber, whose window, fronting the bell-tower of 
the village, receives and reverberates, like a well-articu¬ 
lated ear, under the acoustic structure of the apartment, 
not only the loud and lively peals of the bell, but also 
the strong gusts and whistlings of the wind. For here, 
indeed, nature and religion seem to be in absolute har¬ 
mony at this season, and especially so on this day, and 
to recall to the mind of the survivors pious thoughts of 
the tomb. The bell-ringer, clinging to the rope of the 
belfry, from early in the morning of the ist of November 
till the dawn of the following morning, gives out, inde- 
fatigably and measuredly, by day and by night, the moan¬ 
ing sounds of recollections which fail not to evoke, from 
the heart of every one, the deep and inextinguishable 
memories which the earth-filled shovel of the grave¬ 
digger helped to bury in the field of the dead. This 
bell, turned and tossed and heated by the incessant pull¬ 
ings and jerkings of the ringer, seems to be tortured into 
a state of agony, and to paralyze and break every moment 
as abruptly as the snap of a human fibre. 

These are the views which I expressed here, on the day 
mentioned, a little while ago, in strophes and stanzas, 
which still come stealing upon my memory : 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


27 


THE VILLAGE BELL. 

Oh, when this humble bell, with its slow dirge. 

Sheds like a sigh its sound upon the valley, 

A solemn sound echoed and re-echoed by the near ravine; 
When the bright and blithesome boy who pulls the rope 
Pours out his joyful ditty on the evening breeze, 

Then may one think on earth of things divine. 

When from the vibrating steeple its tenant the swallow 
Takes flight from the loud bronze that shakes its dwelling, 

And over the rippling pond skims but lightly its surface; 

Or when the widow of the village at the knell kneels down, 
After the finishing of the fibres which filled her distaff, 

Then, opportunely for future felicity, may orisons be offered. 

What awakens in my heart the sonorous song from the belfry 
Is not the bright light of the morning, 

Nor the sombre shade of the day near its close; 

Nor yet is it the mirror of my fresh young years, 

Fleet of foot over the hillocks, among fragrant flowers; 

Though these to events past doth the memory beckon back. 

Nor is it my childish slumbers under shades of sycamores, 

Nor the first transports of nature in eagerness for play, 

Nor my random walks over uneven vales or summits rough, 
Nor only quick cries of joy on inhaling zephyr tonics; 

O youth-beguiling morning breezes! full of fair enticing tastes, 
These do ever lead us onward, tantalizing us the more l 

Nor is it the proud steed prancing on the prairie, 

Bending his beauteous neck under the firmly-held bridle, 

And mingling his mane with his rider’s light hair; 

While under his feet the earth resounds like an anvil, 

As rushingly forward he carries me, and as his white froth 
Scatters and silvers all over the grass of the valley. 

Nor yet is it the first faint dream of Love, 

In the month wherein sap fast uprises with Spring, 

Making the pink-beds blossom and the thickets grow green; 
When only a glimpse of the dress, a glance of the eye, 

Of the fair virgins, forthcoming from the waterfall fountains, 
Would cause emotions and tremor deep down in my heart. 


28 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Neither is it the strange whisperings of Glory, 

At the outset silently navigating the billows within ; but soon 
A quaint voice, sweet of song, waking up in my mind 
A delightfully melodious murmur, with ambrosia perfumed, 
Which to its source bears back a whiff of poetry; . . . 

No, Glory, thou it is not that doth now arouse me. 

From my long and regretless days, Fame, hie thee away, 

Into the bereft stubble-fields, among the dead leaves, 

With thy poor renown, thou empty and mocking Echo! 

These flowers of the footpath are divine plants, 

Which perfume the feet; yes, but their roots, indeed, 

Do never entwine themselves around the heart. 

Garlands at feasts, gathered for only one night, 

Are oft poisoned by Hatred, or withered by Envy ; 

Wreaths they are whose crowns by human hands are broken; 
Having, though, to life imparted first a momentary glee; 

But no longer to their stems do the sickly flowers adhere; 
From the fair brow they fall; they fade; they die. 

’Tis the day when the bell through the valley, in tears, 

Rang as if in despair after the funeral knell; 

When two coffins were lowered into the mournful earth. 

And measured sad music with the wailings of women ; 

Three corpses they placed in a double sepulchre, 

And me, aye me, they forgot at the gate! 

From dawn until night, and from night until dawn, 

O bell, thou didst weep, as I wept at that time, 

In accord with the suffocating sobs of my heart. 

With thy bitter complaint air and earth did resound, 

As if every star had lost its own mother, 

And every breeze had lost its own child 1 

In that supreme hour when thy harmony sacred 
In my sorrowful memory to grief is united, 

When thy knell and my heart have only one sound, 

Then thy sonorous bronze, high pendent in steeple, 

Seems to me when it tolls a piece of my soul, 

In rich and rare unison touched by an angel! 

I say to myself, The echo of this vibrating bronze, 

Before reaching my heart, hath filled every pore 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


29 


Of the marble where all my dear past doth repose; 
Amid the din of the old dome it reverberates still; 

Yes, in sweet harmony with this solemn strain resounds 
The stone of the sepulchre where sleeps my love ! 

Be in no way astonished, little bell-boy, if my thought, 
Dreamily lulled by thy inverted but resonant urn, 
Desires its mystical ringing at funerals so sad; 

If, from the first sound that moans under its vault, 

I stop, my breath in suspense, to listen to what 
Death dares whisper to me in a voice subdued. 

Thou alert and faithful trumpeter of human sorrows, 
Born of the earth to proclaim better its griefs, 

Sing! for the sound of broken hearts is enchanting still! 
May thy loud lamentations impart life to the stones, 
True tears to dry eyes, strong incentives to prayer, 

And to the cold tomb a dolefulness due 1 

When at last the grave-digger shall throw on my bier 
The little dust which still will be left of me here, 

After so many deep sighs breathed by me elsewhere; 
When the venal convoy of hired and prim mourners 
Shall deposit down in the earth my mortal remains, 

By grace may I enter the portals of a happier sphere! 

If then some pious and loving hand will ring thee, 
Grieve no one at all with thy symptoms of sadness; 

Nor implore the vale nor the horizon to weep; 

But strike thy festival chimes, and on my tomb jingle 
With the joyous sound of a chain when it falls 
From the limbs of a poor prisoner set free I 


IX. 

The season itself, in which the almanacs place this An¬ 
niversary of the Dead, is in melancholy keeping with the 
mournful aspects and terrors of all these sepulchres; nature 
droops and sobs through all her voices; so near the ex¬ 
piration of the year, the elements fret themselves into 
wailing storms; the equinoctial gale, renewed and pro- 

3 * 


30 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


longed, brings with it, in the night, that peculiarly howl¬ 
ing tempest which is denominated, from its periodical regu¬ 
larity, The Chorus-Squall of the Dead ; the furious 
blasts beat the walls, the gusts and whirlwinds carry to¬ 
gether, no one knows where, clouds of dead leaves; in the 
midst of all of which one hears something like the cries 
and shrieks of distress; also the sinister croakings of the 
crows and ravens, awakened by the dismal surgings to and 
fro of the tree-tops. 

The more powerful blasts of the tempest shake the roof; 
and one might suppose that nocturnal and hostile spirits, 
only freshly and unpropitiously escaped from the tombs, 
are in terrible conflict with one another, and that what 
one hears are the vanquished sprites moaning pitilessly in 
the air. Amidst these mighty roarings, there would seem 
to be distinct voices, which call us by our several names; 
half-familiar knockings against the window-panes and the 
doors, as if to force open, through friendliness, or through 
violence, the partially deserted chambers which these 
boisterous souls may have formerly inhabited. Strange 
as it may seem, I delight in this loud and confused up¬ 
roar ; and I solemnly meditate upon it and upon things 
in general; yet I do so, as I may confess, with a degree 
of shuddering emotion, as, by the glimmering light of 
a winter fire, I recline carelessly upon the stone floor, 
polished by the gentle steps of those loved ones who are 
now reposing not far from me. 

During this .night I purposely surround myself with 
recollections of all that remains in the house of the dear 
little properties and mementos of the unreturning absent 
ones. Eighteen small volumes in manuscript, bound in 
pasteboard of different colors, are scattered around me; 
I open sometimes one, sometimes another; I read; I close 
the book; I open again at random, and examine, among 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


3 * 


other things, the years and dates of the writing; I read, 
and read over again ; I smile sadly or I weep; the writing 
in my hand is the manuscript of my mother. 

My mother, as I have already said in my volume of 
“ Confidences,” never wrote merely to write, still less to 
be admired; although she wrote a great deal, apparently, 
however, only for the purpose of reflecting herself, in a 
true register of her conscience, and in the domestic events 
of her daily life,—a moral mirror of her own existence 
and actions, wherein she would often look at herself, in 
scrupulous comparison and contrast with what she had 
been in former times, and with the unceasing desire and 
effort to become better and better every day. This habit, 
so to speak, of registering an account with her own heart 
and soul, she kept up until the end; and it has produced 
from fifteen to twenty little manuscript volumes of inti¬ 
mate personal confidences, which I have had the happi¬ 
ness to keep with care and safety, and in which I always 
find her still alive and loving, whenever I experience the 
necessity of taking refuge once more in her heart ! 

Yet she did not write with that force of conception, and 
that relief of image and metaphor, which characterize 
the ingenuity of expression. She spoke and wrote with 
natural and .unpretentious simplicity, and with the perfect 
candor and freedom of one who never studied herself. 
She sought and used only such words as would render her 
thoughts with precision ; as she purchased or prepared 
her garments only to dress herself, and not to adorn her¬ 
self. Her superiority was not in her style, but in her 
beauty and amiability; for it is pre-eminently in the heart 
that nature has placed the distinctive genius of women; 
because the works of women are the works of love. It 
was only by an unusual power of attractive goodness that 
one ever felt drawn toward her. It was a superiority at 


3 2 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


first quite unperceived and always inoffensive, which one 
did not recognize nor experience but by adoring her. 


x. 

Possessor as I am of the delicate and priceless treasure 
of recollections now under consideration, I have often 
purposed to spread out before myself, at my leisure, this 
precious manuscript, hid away in the deepest drawer of 
my desk, and to make from it at least a few brief extracts, 
accompanied with befitting commentaries for the family; 
in order that even the little which still remains here below, 
of the soul of such an excellent mother, may not vanish 
entirely without having, in some degree, been first breathed 
and assimilated by her grandchildren. To-night this 
purpose takes possession of me more strongly than ever 
before, because of the tolling of the bell which vibrates 
over her tomb, and which seems to reproach me for re¬ 
maining silent, when even the cold bronze itself finds a 
voice to remember her. 

The years accumulate; the evening of life approaches ; 
the dust of time begins to tarnish these very leaves, upon 
which the ink is now turning yellow. I am in one of 
those rare moments of contemplation, of solitude, of 
leisure, of twilight, where the thought detaches itself 
from the cares of active life and ascends quickly to its 
source, in evenness and smoothness, somewhat like still 
waters, without wind and without declivity, where it is 
impossible to discern the current; indeed, it is the hour 
to accomplish my long-cherished and pious design, and 
so bring to light, at last, for myself and kindred, this 
sacred relic. 

The greater number of these lines will be read only by 
the light of the hearth of this mother, and by the eyes 
which have wept on her account; others have little or no 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


33 


interest in them. However, of all the varied spectacles 
which nature or history presents to the eye of a sensitive 
and considerate man, there can scarcely be one more in¬ 
teresting than the sight of a soul struggling with the cir¬ 
cumstances, the joys, the sorrows, the vicissitudes of life; 
even though the soul in question be only that of a poor 
and obscure woman, riveted down to the most monotonous 
of domestic duties, with her rustic husband and children. 
The drama is not in the scene; it is in the soul. Let a 
tear drop for the downfall of a great empire or for the 
destruction of an humble cottage, it is the same water! 


XI. 

One always wishes to know something of a person 
whose heart he hears speak. Here, then, is my mother’s 
portrait, such as I find it in my confidential notes as they 
appear on the first pages of her life: 

“ Alice de Roy was the maiden name of my good 
mother. She was the daughter of Monsieur de Roy, 
Administrator-General of the Finances of the Duke of 
Orleans. Madame de Roy, his wife, was under-governess 
of the children of that prince, and a favorite of that 
beautiful and virtuous Duchess of Orleans whom the 
Revolution respected even while it expelled her from 
her palace and led her children away into exile and her 
husband to the scaffold. Monsieur and Madame de Roy 
had lodgings at the royal palace in winter and at Saint 
Cloud in the summer. 

“My mother was born there. She was brought up and 
educated with King Louis Philippe, in that respectful and 
decorous familiarity which is always established between 
well-born children of about the same age, sharing the 
same lessons and the same games. How often has my 
happy mother entertained us with a recital of the incidents 

B* 


34 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


of the education of that prince, whom one revolution had 
driven away from his country and another revolution was 
to exalt upon a throne ! 

“ There is not a fountain, an alley, nor a grass-plot, of 
the gardens of Saint Cloud that we did not know through 
her oft-recited recollections of her childhood, even before 
we had seen them ourselves. Saint Cloud was to her her 
home, her cradle, the endeared spot where all her first 
thoughts had germinated, had taken root, and had ex¬ 
panded with the plants and trees of that beautiful park. 
Many of the most honorable and renowned names of the 
eighteenth century were the first names which had been 
impressed on her memory. 

“ Madame de Roy, the mother of my mother, was a 
woman of merit. Her duties in the house of the first 
prince of the blood drew around her a great many of the 
celebrated and influential personages of that time. Vol¬ 
taire, on his last journey to Paris, which was an uninter¬ 
rupted triumph, came to pay a visit to the young princes. 
My mother, who was then only between seven and eight 
years of age, was present at the visit; and, though so 
young, she understood, by the impressions which were 
awakened around her, that she saw in his person something 
more than a king. The very attitude of Voltaire, his 
costume, his cane, his gestures, his words, had been in¬ 
delibly engraved on this infantile mind, as plainly as the 
impressions of the fossil remains of the antediluvian crea¬ 
tures in the rocks of our mountains. 

“ D’Alembert, Laclos, Madame de Genlis, Buffon, Flo- 
rian, the English historian Gibbon, the German scholar 
Grimm, Morellet, Necker, the men of letters generally, 
the philosophers of the time, lived much in the society 
of Madame de Roy. She had especially maintained 
friendly relations with the most immortal of them all, 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


35 


Jean Jacques Rousseau. My mother, though very pious 
and very strictly attached to the dogmas of the church, 
had nevertheless formed a very high opinion of this great 
man ; undoubtedly because he was possessed of something 
more than genius; he was possessed of a soul. She was 
not a follower of the religion of his head; but she was 
influenced by a sincere regard for the religion of his heart. 

XII. 

“The Duke of Orleans, who is also Count of Beaujolais, 
had the nomination of a certain number of ladies to the 
Order of Salles, a religious community, which belonged 
to his duchy. It was thus that my mother became a 
member of that order, at the age of even less than sixteen 
years. I still have one of her portraits painted at that 
age, besides the several pictures of herself, which all her 
sisters, and my father himself, have so often drawn for us 
from memory. She is represented in the costume which 
belonged to her as a canoness. A tall, slender young 
lady, with a flexible figure, and with beautiful white arms, 
shown below the elbow, from the narrow sleeves of a 
black woolen dress. Upon her bosom hangs the little 
golden cross of the order. Over her black hair falls and 
waves, on each side of the head, a black lace veil; yet it 
is less black than her hair. Amidst these sombre colors, 
it is alone her young and artless countenance that shines 
with brightness. 

“Time has somewhat effaced the bloom of a com¬ 
plexion of only sixteen summers. But the features are as 
regular and perfect as if the painter’s pigments had not 
yet dried upon the canvas. There is that inward smile of 
satisfaction; that unvarying tenderness of the soul as seen 
in the face; and, above all, that ray of serene light so 
significant of intellect, and so surcharged with gushing 


3 6 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


sensibility, that it ran out and radiated sympathetically in 
every direction, like an eternal caress from her somewhat 
deep-set eyes, slightly veiled as they were by her half- 
languid eyelids, as if she deemed it not best to let out 
at once all the brightness which dwelt in her lustrous orbs 
of vision. 

“One may well understand, on merely beholding this 
portrait, something of the interest and passion which 
such a woman must have inspired in my father, and also 
something of the respect and piety which, in after-days, 
she was to inspire in her children. 

“My father himself, the Chevalier de Lamartine, at 
this time, by the handsomeness of his person, and by his 
good qualities, dignity, and charms, was worthy to attach 
and secure to himself the heart of an affectionate and 
courageous woman. He was no longer young: he was 
thirty-eight years of age. Yet for a man of robust an¬ 
cestry, who was to die still young in mind and body at 
the age of ninety, with all his teeth, all his hair, and all 
the severe and imposing beauty which old age allows, 
thirty-eight years was just the prime of life. His tall 
figure, his military attitude, his manly features, had all 
the characteristics of order and command. Unconscious 
pride and frankness were the two most prominent traits 
which were reflected in his physiognomy. He affected 
neither levity nor grace, although his nature was well 
freighted with both in reserve. With a wonderful flowing 
of blood in the depths of his heart, he yet seemed cold 
and indifferent at the surface, because he modestly dis¬ 
trusted himself, and was of a most quiet and retiring dis¬ 
position. 

“There never was in all the world a man who doubted 
more of his own virtue, or who was more accustomed to 
clothe with woman-like gentleness the severe perfections 



MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


37 


of a hero. For many years I was myself mistaken. I 
thought him hard and austere, when, in truth, he was 
only just and exact. With regard to his tastes, they were 
as simple and primitive as his heart. A patriarch and 
a soldier; in these characters was combined the whole 
man. Hunting and rambling in the woods, when he was 
on a six-months’ furlough in the country; the rest of the 
year, his regiment; his horse; his arms; the regulations 
scrupulously kept and ennobled by tire enthusiasm of a 
soldier’s life; these were his only occupations. 

“ He could see nothing above his rank of Captain of 
Cavalry, and the esteem of his comrades. To him his 
regiment was even more than his family. He desired 
its honor quite as much as his own. He knew per¬ 
sonally, and could call by name, all the officers, all the 
soldiers, of his regiment. He was adored by them. His 
profession was his life. Without any other kind of ambi¬ 
tion, whether of mere fortune or of any one of the still 
higher grades or spheres of intellectual achievement, his 
ideal was only that of being what he was in fact, a good 
officer. Honor he regarded as the synonym of soul, and 
the service of the king as a good religion. Fixed in these 
opinions, nothing pleased him better than to pass six 
months of his life in a garrisoned town, and the other six 
months in and about his own little house in the country, 
with his wife and children. This man of nature, whose 
primitive instincts and habits had, however, undergone 
some slight modification in the course of his training as a 
soldier, was my worthy father. 

“The Revolution and other misfortunes, together with 
the chastening influences of time and reflection, polished 
and perfected him in his advanced age. I can safely say 
that I have myself seen his great and self-governed nature 
strongly develop itself even after he had passed his seven- 

4 


33 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


tieth year. He was of the race of those giant oaks which 
renew and enlarge themselves until the very day when 
the axe is laid to the trunk. Even at eighty years of age 
he was still perfectly himself. 

XIII. 

“All the obstacles of fortune and of family prejudices, 
which opposed themselves to his marriage, were over¬ 
come by his own constancy and devotion, and by the 
affectionate prudence and firmness of my mother. They 
were united at the very moment when the Revolution was 
about to break up in France all human establishments, 
and to convulse and rend the very earth itself upon 
which they were founded. 

“Already the regularly constituted but discontented 
Assembly was at work. It undermined, as it were, with 
the force of a superhuman reason, both the privileges and 
the prejudices upon which the ancient social order of 
France had so long reposed. 

“Already those unduly excited emotions of the people, 
as violent and irresistible as the waves which the high 
winds begin to heave, bore down before them, first the 
palace at Versailles, then the Bastile, and then the City 
Hall at Paris. But the enthusiasm of the nobility for 
the great political and religious systems of the France 
of yore subsisted even yet. Notwithstanding these first 
severe shocks to which the realm had been subjected, they 
believed that the agitation and disturbance would be but 
temporary. In the past they had never had any scale or 
other standard of measure which would enable them to 
calculate fairly beforehand the great height which the 
overflowing of new ideas would be likely to attain. 

“ My father did not resign his service in the army after 
his marriage. He could not conceive of anything more 




MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


39 


honorable or proper than to follow his flag, to defend 
the king, to battle against disorder, and to shed his blood, 
if necessary, in the discharge of his duty. Those first 
tokens of a terrible tempest which was to overthrow a 
throne, and to cause tremblings and tumults throughout 
Europe during half a century at least, affected but slightly 
my newly-married father and mother, who were just then 
wrapped up in the first joys of their perfect love, and 
with bright hopes of undiminished happiness in the future. 

“I remember having one day seen a branch of a willow 
separated from its trunk by the storm and floating down 
the current of the Saone. A female nightingale, governed 
by motherly instincts and devotion, sat yet on her swim¬ 
ming nest, adrift in the foam of the river, while the male, 
flying excitedly and affectionately, followed his love upon 
the wreck. 

XIV. 

“Scarcely had my newly-wedded parents entered upon 
the full enjoyment of the happiness for which they had 
so long looked, when it seemed to be necessary to inter¬ 
rupt it, and to have to be separated, perhaps, alas, never 
to meet again ! It was the period of emigration, volun¬ 
tary or compulsory. At this epoch emigration was not 
precisely what it was somewhat later, when it was so 
largely resorted to as a means of avoiding persecution 
and death. A sort of universal fashion of expatriation 
had seized the French nobility. The example set by the 
princes became contagious. Whole regiments lost their 
officers in a single night. It was a shame, for a certain 
time, to remain where the king and France were. 

“ Great decision of mind and great firmness of charac¬ 
ter were necessary to resist this epidemic folly (not to say 
cowardice), which strangely enough took the name of 
honor. My father had the peculiar courage requisite in 


40 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


this emergency; he refused to emigrate. Only when 
they exacted from the officers of the army an oath which 
was repugnant to his conscience as a servant of the king, 
did he tender his resignation. But the ioth of August 
was approaching; one felt it coming fast. 

* ‘ Quite well was it known beforehand that the palace 
of the Tuileries would be attacked, and that the tenure 
of the king’s authority would be endangered. It was 
also hoped and believed that the constitution of 1791, a 
momentary compact of conciliation between the repre¬ 
sentatives of royalty and the sovereign people, would be 
overthrown and consigned to oblivion. The devoted 
friends of what yet remained of the monarchy, and the 
men personally and religiously attached to the king, 
united themselves to strengthen the Constitutional Guard 
of Louis XVI., and on the day of peril they faithfully 
ranged themselves around him. My father was of the 
number of those true-hearted men. 

“ My mother was then bearing me unborn. She made 
no effort to detain my father at home. Even in the 
midst of her grief and tears, she could never understand 
or value life without honor, nor did she ever hesitate a 
moment between a distress and a duty ; she would endure 
the distress and perform the duty. 

“ My father’s departure was almost equally without 
hope and without hesitation. He fought together with 
the Constitutional Guard and with the Swiss to defend the 
palace. When Louis XVI. abandoned his castle the battle 
became a massacre. My father was wounded by a shot in 
the garden of the Tuileries. He escaped, momentarily, 
but was arrested while crossing the river, opposite the In- 
valides, and taken to Vaugirard, where he was imprisoned 
several hours in a cellar. He was there demanded and 
released by the gardener of one of his relatives, who 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


41 


was a municipal officer of the Commune. Having thus 
escaped death, he returned to my mother, and lived with 
her in profound obscurity, secluded in the country, until 
the evil days when the rancorous madness of revolu¬ 
tionary persecution left no other place of refuge to those 
who adhered to the old system than imprisonment or the 
scaffold. 

xv. 

“ One night the populace came to tear away from their 
home my grandfather, in spite of his eighty years, my 
grandmother, almost as aged and infirm, my two uncles, 
and my two aunts, who were nuns, and who had already 
been driven out of their convent. All the family were 
crowded pell-mell into a common cart, and escorted by 
policemen, who led them, amidst the coarse and vulgar 
hootings of a mob, to Autun. There an immense prison 
had been erected to receive all the suspected persons of 
the province. My father, for a particular reason known 
only to his enemies, was separated from the rest of the 
family and shut up in the prison of Macon. My mother, 
who, at the time, was nursing me, was left alone in my 
grandfather’s mansion, which was watched over by a small 
company of soldiers of the revolutionary army. 

“ Can any one wonder that the men whose lives date 
from those sinister days have brought with them into the 
world a predisposition to sadness, or that thus Melancholy 
itself has, of late, come to be largely intermingled with 
French genius? Virgil, Cicero, Tibullus, and Horace 
also, who impressed upon Roman genius the distinctive 
qualities of infelicity and solemnity, were they not born 
during the great civil wars of Rome, and within sound of 
the shocking proscriptions of Marius, of Sylla, and of 
Caesar ? Let us think for a moment, and without prudery, 
of the impressions of terror and of pity which convulsed 

4* 


42 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


the frames of the war-oppressed Roman mothers whilst 
they bore those men, as embryos, in their wombs. Ay, 
let us think also, however vaguely or dreamily, of the 
milk, embittered with tears, which, as an infant, I myself 
took from my mother; whilst the whole family were in 
a captivity which promised relief only in death; whilst, 
indeed, the loving and lion-hearted husband whom she 
adored was upon the very steps of the scaffold, and she 
herself a captive in a lonely house guarded by malicious 
soldiers, who, counting her tears as so many crimes against 
themselves and their masters, scrupled not to insult her 
great grief. 


XVI. 

“ On the premises of my grandfather, and very near to 
his mansion, which extended from one street to the other, 
there stood a low and sombre little house, which commu¬ 
nicated with the mansion by a dark passage and by small 
narrow and damp court-yards. This house served to 
lodge old servants who had been wholly or partly retired 
from the service of my grandfather, but who were still 
held to the family by small pensions which they continued 
to receive, and by some slight services gratuitously ren¬ 
dered by them from time to time to their old and young 
masters and mistresses. These supernumerary assistants 
were a kind of freed Romans, such as most of the better 
families in France had the happiness to have. When the 
mansion itself was brought under the mandate of seques¬ 
tration, my mother retired, with one or two women, into 
this little house. Yet there is still another reason why 
she went there. 

“ Exactly opposite the windows of this cottage, on the 
other side of the dark lane, silent and narrow, like a street 
in Genoa, there arose, and still arises to-day, a high wall, 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


43 


pierced by the peculiar apertures of an ancient convent 
of the Ursulines. A building austere in its aspect, and as 
unostentatious and simple in all respects as its mission, 
it yet had the imposing and beautiful front of an adjacent 
church on one of its sides, and in the rear large and deep 
court-yards and a spacious garden surrounded by strong 
black walls, whose height repressed all thought of ven¬ 
turing over them. As the common jails and dungeons of 
the town already overflowed with captives* the revolution¬ 
ary tribunal of Macon had this convent arranged and oc¬ 
cupied as an additional prison. Chance or Providence 
caused my father to be incarcerated in the new Bastile 
here described. 

“ There was thus between happiness and himself only 
a wall and the width of a street. Another chance would 
have it that this convent of the Ursulines should be as 
well known to him, in all its details, as his own private 
house. One of my grandfather’s sisters, whose name was 
Madame de Lusy, was Abbess of the Ursulines of Macon. 
Her brother’s children in their early days came regularly 
and constantly to play in the convent. There was no 
alley in the garden, no cellar, no private staircase, no 
garret, no lumber-room nor air-hole, that was not well 
known to them. Nor was there any part of the structure, 
within or without, of which their infantile memories had 
not retained even the most minute details. 

“Thrown suddenly into this prison, my father found 
himself in a perfectly well-known place. To crown his 
happiness, the jailer (a not over-resentful sort of repub¬ 
lican) had, fifteen years previously, been a cuirassier in 
my father’s troop. This man’s new grade of service did 
not change his heart. Accustomed to respect and to 
love his captain, he was visibly and favorably affected on 
thus meeting him again after the lapse of so many years; 


44 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


and when the doors of the Ursulines were closed upon 
the prisoner, it was the jailer who wept. 

“ My father found himself there in good company, 
and with no lack of companions in captivity. The con¬ 
vent contained about two hundred prisoners, not one of 
whom, however, had committed any crime; they were 
only the most prominent of the suspected people of the 
province. They were crowded to excess in the halls of 
the refectories and in the corridors of the old convent. 
My father asked the jailer, as an especial favor, to put 
him in the garret. A high dormer-window opening upon 
the street would at least afford him the opportunity and 
consolation of scanning occasionally, through the iron 
grating, the familiar roof of his own house. This favor 
was granted him without hesitation. He installed him¬ 
self in the garret, with nothing movable about him but 
some loose planks and a miserable pallet. In the day¬ 
time he would come down with his fellow-captives, to 
take his meals, to play cards, and to talk about the affairs 
of the country; in regard to which, however, the pris¬ 
oners could do little else than make conjectures, as they 
were not permitted any written communication from 
without. But this isolation and espionage did not long 
affect my father with great grief. 

‘‘The same sentiment which had impelled him to 
solicit the jailer for a cell opening to the street, and 
which kept him whole hours looking toward the roof of 
his little house opposite, had also inspired my mother 
with the thought of ascending often to the 7 garret of that 
same little house, and there seating herself somewhat be¬ 
hind the window, so as to see without being seen. Once 
there, she would eagerly gaze through her tears upon the 
roof of the prison, where he whom she loved so well, 
having been ruthlessly torn away from her, had been hid- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


45 


den from her eyes. Two thoughts, two souls that long 
and sigh for each other through the universe, are not un¬ 
apt to meet again. Over otlly two neighboring walls and 
one narrow street, could their eyes fail of simultaneous 
and joyful recognition? Their hearts were mutually 
moved; their thoughts and wishes were well understood 
by each other; and their signs supplied/the place of 
words because it was feared that their voices, if used, 
might reveal their communications and designs to the 
wary sentinels on the street. Seated opposite each other, 
they thus passed several hours regularly every day. Their 
whole souls had respectively passed into their eyes. 

“ My mother first conceived the idea of writing con¬ 
cise lines in large letters, containing, in few words, what 
she wished to make known to the loved and loving pris¬ 
oner. He answered by signs. From that very moment 
their correspondence was established. My father, in his 
honorary capacity of a Knight of the Arquebuse, had in 
his house a bow with arrows, with which I had often 
played in my childhood. My mother contrived to use 
them as a means of communicating more freely and fully 
with my father. She practiced several days in her cham¬ 
ber, shooting at a target with an arrow; and when she 
had become sufficiently skilled in its use to be certain of 
not missing her aim at a distance of several yards, she 
attached a small but long and strong string to an arrow, 
which, by means of the bow, she then shot forward into 
the window of the prisoner. My father quickly and dex¬ 
terously concealed the arrow, and then, hastily drawing 
the string toward him, he drew up a letter. 

“ In this way, favored by the darkness of the night, 
paper, pens, and even ink, and other small articles of 
stationery, were passed to him. He replied at leisure. 
My mother, on her own side, would come before the 


46 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


break of day to get the long letters in which her captive 
husband poured out his love and his sadness, and in 
which he kindly interrogated, advised, and consoled his 
wife, and spoke also of his child. My poor mother 
brought me in her arms, every day, to the garret, where 
she would show me to my father, nursing me before him, 
and making me hold my two little hands toward the 
grate of the prison; then, pressing my face against her 
bosom, she would, in an ecstasy of affection, almost de¬ 
vour me with kisses, addressing thus to the prisoner all 
the caresses with which she covered me for his sake. 

XVII. 

“ It was about that time that the Proconsuls of the 
Convention divided and shared among themselves the 
provinces of France, and exercised over them, in the 
name of the public good, an absolute and often sanguinary 
power. The fortunes, the lives, and even the deaths of 
whole families, depended on a word of those representa¬ 
tives, on an emotion of their hearts, or on a signature of 
their hands. My mother, who felt that the sword was 
actually suspended over the head of her husband, whom 
she idolized, had several times been inclined to go and 
throw herself at the feet of the nearest and most powerful 
representatives of the Convention, and to implore them 
for the liberty of my father. Her youth, her beauty, her 
loneliness, the child that she carried at her breast, and 
the advice even of my father, had until then restrained 
her from that purpose. But the earnest entreaties of 
other members of the family, also immured in the dun¬ 
geons of Autun, imperiously demanded a step no less 
humiliating to her pride than to her opinions. From the 
revolutionary authorities of Macon she obtained a pass¬ 
port for Dijon and for Lyons. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


47 


“ How often has she narrated to me her reluctance, 
her discouragement, her terrors, when finally it became 
necessary, after innumerable applications and solicita¬ 
tions peremptorily rejected, for her to appear again and 
again, trembling, in the presence of representatives of the 
people, on a mission so very important to herself and 
others, and yet so delicate ! Sometimes it was a blunt 
and brutal man, who would sternly refuse to listen to this 
woman in tears, and who would hastily and passionately 
dismiss her with threats, as if she were guilty of a desire 
to relax the justice of the nation. Sometimes it was an 
amiable and tender-hearted man, whom the sight of such 
deep affection and such woeful despair inclined, in spite 
of himself, to pity, but whom the presence of his col¬ 
leagues hardened in appearance; so that he would deny 
with his lips what he yet granted with his heart. 

“ The representative Javogue was the only one of all 
these Proconsuls who left on the mind of my mother 
a very good impression of his character. Having been 
introduced to him at Dijon, he spoke to her with manly 
kindness and respect. She had brought me in her arms 
to the drawing-room of this representative, in order that 
pity might touch him in two ways : first, in the suffering 
of a young mother; and, second, in the misfortune of an 
innocent child. Javogue invited her to a seat, and then 
himself complained of the rigor which his functions and 
the safety of the republic imposed upon him. He took 
me somewhat awkwardly upon his knees, and as my 
mother made a movement of fright, in the apprehension 
that he might let me fall, he said, ‘Fear nothing, my 
good woman ; the republicans also have children.’ And 
as I, in my unsophisticated babyhood, smilingly played 
with the ends of his tricolored scarf, he remarked to my 
mother, ‘ Thy little son is very beautiful to be the child 


48 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


of an aristocrat. Bring him up for the country, and make 
of him a citizen.’ He then gave her some encouraging 
words, of much interest to my father, and held out some 
faint hopes of an approaching liberty. It may be that it 
was to Javogue that my father owed his having been for¬ 
gotten in his prison; for an order of trial, in those times, 
was itself equivalent to a sentence of death. 

“ Returning to Macon, and there re-entering her little 
house, she herself lived imprisoned, as it were, in her own 
narrow home, just opposite the Ursulines. From time to 
time, when the moon was absent, and the night very dark, 
and the street-lamps blown out by a winter’s wind, the 
knotted string silently slipped across the street from one 
window to the other; and so my father would pass anx¬ 
ious but delightful hours near to the one being upon earth 
whom he most loved. 

“ Eighteen long months were thus passed. 

“ The ninth of Thermidor opened all the prisons. My 
father was free. My mother hastened to Autun for his 
old and infirm parents, and brought them back to their 
long-closed home. Soon after their return, however, my 
grandfather and my grandmother died, in peace and full 
of years, sorrowfully attended by the fullest sympathy and 
kindness of both family and friends. They had weathered 
together the great tempest of life, and had been severely 
shaken by it, but not overthrown. They had not suf¬ 
fered the loss of any one of their children, and they 
hoped and prayed, on closing their eyes, that Heaven’s 
wrath was appeased for a long time to come, and that 
life itself would thenceforth be smoother and sweeter for 
those to whom they had transmitted their names before 
leaving the earth. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


49 


XVIII. 

“ The fortune of my grandfather, by his own intentions 
and in accordance with the usages of the times, was to 
have passed entirely into the possession of his eldest son. 
But the new system of government having repealed the 
law of primogeniture and forbidden all practices of en- 
tailment, and having also rendered nugatory all such 
vows of poverty and religion as had been taken by my 
aunts, my father’s sisters, the surviving members of the 
family, finding at once their rights and their duties before 
the law, proceeded immediately to an equitable division 
of the estate. The landed property of this estate was 
considerable, both in Doubs and in Burgundy. My 
father, on asking his share, like his brothers and sisters, 
might perhaps with one word have changed his fate and 
secured one of the beautiful territorial possessions which 
the family were about to divide among them. Yet his 
scrupulous regard for his father’s will prevented him from 
even dreaming of violating it after his death. The revo¬ 
lutionary proceedings which resulted in the abrogation 
of the law of primogeniture were of very recent date; 
and although he considered those proceedings in that 
respect entirely just, still they had in his eyes an ap¬ 
pearance of disrespect, if not of violence, done to paternal 
authority. To ask for the application of the new law in 
his favor against his eldest brother seemed to him like an 
attempt to take advantage of his position. 

“Without at all contending for his legal rights, he 
voluntarily renounced the purpose of inheriting any part 
of the landed estates of his father and mother, and de¬ 
clared himself well satisfied with only the very moderate 
means of support which his contract of marriage had 
secured for himself and family. He deliberately made 
c 5 


5 ° 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


himself poor, having but one word to say to make him¬ 
self rich. The property of the family was immediately 
divided, ea,ch of his brothers and sisters having received 
an ample share. He would have nothing ; only he re¬ 
tained as his own absolute property the little estate of 
Milly, which they had assigned to him on his marriage, 
and which then yielded an income of only about five 
hundred and forty dollars per annum. 

“My mother's dowry was moderate. The salaries of 
the offices which her father and her brothers had held 
in the House of Orleans had entirely disappeared with 
the Revolution. The princesses of the royal family of 
France were in exile. They sometimes wrote to my 
mother. They kindly and affectionately remembered the 
friendship of their childhood with the daughter of their 
under-governess. Even in their prolonged exile they did 
not cease to remind my mother that she had a warm and 
ever-abiding place in their memory, nor did they forget 
to send her, occasionally, unique and precious mementos 
of their loving regards. 

XIX. 

“ My father did not feel himself relieved, by the Revo¬ 
lution, of his obligation of fidelity to his banner. His 
honor, as he believed, was inseparably connected with the 
flag of France of the old regime. This sentiment closed 
every avenue to any probable increase of his fortune. 
An income of only five hundred and forty dollars a year, 
and a small, dilapidated and almost empty house in the 
country, for himself, his wife, and his several children, 
who were already beginning to be seated in goodly num¬ 
bers at the family table, was a condition of things not 
easily definable between frugal ease and pinching poverty. 
Yet he had the great satisfaction of an approving con¬ 
science ; his love for his wife and children; the rural 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


51 


simplicity of his tastes; his rigid but generous economy; 
the almost perfect conformity of his wants with his situa¬ 
tion and circumstances; and, in a word, his implicit and 
religious faith in God. With these he courageously met 
all the straits and difficulties of his existence. 

“ Young, beautiful, brought up amid all the elegances 
of a splendid court, my mother, with her accustomed 
smiling resignation and with her invariable inward hap¬ 
piness, passed from the gorgeous apartments and gar¬ 
dens of a princely mansion to the small and unfurnished 
chambers of a house which had been vacant for nearly a 
century, and to a garden of only the fourth of an acre, 
fenced in with rugged rocks, where all the beautiful and 
romantic dreams of her youth were to be measured in 
contrast with the realities of life. I have often heard 
both of my parents say that, notwithstanding the insuf¬ 
ficiency of their fortune, these first years of calm, after 
the perilous tossings of the storms of the Revolution,— 
these peaceful years of retirement in their love and of 
their general enjoyment of themselves in this rural soli¬ 
tude,—were, in the main, the happiest years of their 
lives. 

“ My mother had to endure the inconveniences of 
much poverty, yet she always despised riches. How 
often has she said to me, in later years, pointing with her 
finger to the narrow boundaries of the garden and of the 
fields of Milly, 1 Our estate is very small, but it is large 
enough if we will only learn how to accommodate our 
wants to our circumstances. Happiness depends so much 
upon the just accounts we keep with our own consciences, 
and upon our kindly dispositions and actions toward one 
another, that we could hardly increase it for ourselves 
by adding to the boundaries of either our meadows or 
our vineyards. Happiness is not measured by the acre 


5 2 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


like the earth, it is measured by the gentleness and resig¬ 
nation of the heart; for God has ordained that, in the 
grand consummation of events, the poor shall have as 
much and be quite as felicitous as the rich; and this to 
the end that, in the better future, no one may ever have 
the need or the inclination to seek favors of any being 
less perfect or less powerful than Himself.’ ” 


xx. 

Here I find the portrait of my mother at thirty-eight 
years of age; these are the outlines: 

“ It is night; the doors of the little country house are 
closed. A friendly dog barks, from time to time, in the 
front yard. The autumn rain patters against the window- 
panes of the two lower windows; and the gale, blowing 
in spasmodic squalls, or breaking against the repellent 
branches of two or three sycamores, and penetrating 
between the interstices of the window-shutters, produces 
those intermittent and melancholy hissings of the winds 
which can be well heard only on the borders of the great 
pine-woods, when one seats himself at their feet to listen 
to them. 

“The chamber where I thus find myself again is large 
enough, but almost bare. In the back part of it there is 
a deep alcove, with a bed in it. The curtains of this bed 
are of white serge, with blue squares; it is the bed of my 
mother. There are two cradles, upon wooden rockers, at 
the foot of this bed,—one large, the other small; these 
are the cradles of my younger sisters, who have been 
already sleeping more than an hour. A large fire of vine- 
fuel burns in the back of a fire-place of white stone. 

“ One may here see how the hammer of the Revolution 
has cracked the mantel-piece in several places, defacing 
the arms and the lily-flowers of the ornaments. The 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


53 


sheet of wrought iron of the fire-grate is turned inside 
out, because, undoubtedly, the arms of the king were 
sketched on the surface of the other side. Great beams, 
blackened by the smoke, as well as the planks which they 
support immediately below the roof, constitute the ceil¬ 
ing. Under our feet there is neither board floor nor 
carpet, but only plain squares of unpolished bricks. 
These bricks are of the color of the earth, and are 
broken into a thousand pieces by the wood-shod and 
iron-heeled country clowns, who had made of it their 
dancing-room during the imprisonment of my father. 
There is no tapestry, nor painted paper, on the walls of 
the chamber; nothing but the plaster, broken here and 
there, showing the naked stones of the walls, somewhat 
as one may see at times the limbs and the joints of a 
beggar through a torn dress. 

“In one corner of the chamber there is a small harp¬ 
sichord, opened, with music-books, including the 4 Wizard 
of the Village,’ by Jean Jacques Rousseau, scattered at 
random over the instrument. Nearer the fire, in the 
middle of the room, stands a small card-table, covered 
with a green cloth, all spotted with ink, and full of holes. 
Upon the table are two candlesticks of plated copper; 
and in these are burning two tallow candles, which throw 
a dim and flickering light, visibly agitated by the air, 
upon the whitewashed walls of the apartment. 

“Opposite the fire-place, his elbow resting upon the 
table, sits a man, who is holding in his hands a book, 
which he is reading with close attention. His high 
stature and his robust body are pleasingly conspicuous; 
he still preserves all the health and strength of his vigor¬ 
ous youth. His open countenance, his blue eyes, his 
firm and gracious smile, his dazzling white teeth, these 
are all natural characteristics of the man. Some remain- 
5 * 


54 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


ing articles of his former costume, his head-dress espe¬ 
cially, and a certain military stiffness of attitude, attest 
the retired officer. If one were inclined to doubt' this 
conclusion, it would only be necessary to look at his 
sword, his army pistols, his helmet, and the gilded clasps 
of his charger’s bridle, which glitter suspended from a nail 
projecting from the back wall of a small closet opening 
into the room. This man is my father. 

“ Upon a braided rattan sofa, in the corner which con¬ 
tains the fire-place and a small alcove, is seated a woman, 
who, though she still looks very young, already verges 
closely on thirty-eight years. Her tall figure has yet all 
the flexibility and all the elegance of a young girl. Her 
features are so delicate; her black eyes have such a candid 
and penetrating glance; one can plainly perceive, under 
the slightly pale tissue of her transparent skin, the blue 
veins, and the changeable coloring of her least and sim¬ 
plest emotions. Her very black and very fine hair falls 
down over her cheeks to her shoulders, so wavy, so 
curly, and so coquettish, that it would be almost impos¬ 
sible for a stranger to tell whether she is only eighteen 
or thirty-eight years of age. Yet no one would now 
wish to take off from her age any one of her years, which 
only serve to perfect her physiognomy and complete her 
beauty. 

“ This beauty of my mother, so faultless in each sepa¬ 
rate feature, is particularly striking when observed in its 
usual fullness. It is a type of beauty which, from the cul¬ 
tivated and artistic eye, invariably receives admiration by 
its harmony, by its grace, and, above all, by that radi¬ 
ance of inward tenderness and love which so plainly re¬ 
veals the outcroppings of a sanctified soul. For, for the 
soul itself, the seat of beauty and goodness, as thus dimly 
seen in outline, the most beautiful face in the world is 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


55 

of itself only an outward and most imperfect manifesta¬ 
tion. 

“This young woman, now half reclining upon a cush¬ 
ion, holds in her arms a little girl, gently sleeping, with 
her head upon her shoulders. Wound around her tiny 
fingers, the child still holds, engrasped, one of the black 
tresses of her mother’s hair, with which she was playing 
only a moment ago, ere she fell asleep. Another little 
girl, older than the one just mentioned, is seated upon a 
footstool, near the end of the sofa; she rests her golden¬ 
haired head upon her mother’s knees. This young woman 
is my mother; these two children are my elder sisters. 
Two others are in their cradles.” 


XXI. 

Such was the every-day life of the family at the time 
when my mother recommenced her journal, on the nth 
of June, 1801. It would seem that, in her youth, and, 
indeed, from her very childhood, she had been in the 
habit of making records of family confidences of this sort, 
registering them especially for herself; evidently impelled 
to it by a species of childish rivalry with the more ad¬ 
vanced pupils of Madame de Genlis, at the Royal Palace, 
where she herself was educated. The journal reopens 
thus: 

“ In early life I had begun to keep an exact journal of 
everything that happened to me or around me, and to 
note down all the ideas and reflections which the various 
events of my life would suggest to me. That journal I 
destroyed, and, for a long while past, have been quite a 
stranger to the habit of keeping a diary. Yet I have re¬ 
pented, and am heartily sorry for what I did, because I 
am of the opinion that, sooner or later, the diary so begun 
might have been useful. It is now my intention to begin 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


56 

again, and, with God’s grace, to write, as may be con¬ 
venient, at the close of every day, the different events and 
experiences through which I may have passed, and also 
whatever right or wrong thing I may have done. This, 
I think, will help me to make the necessary examina¬ 
tion of my conscience, and better acquaint me with the 
general condition of my own soul. Moreover, it occurs 
to me that if, at any time, my children should, by chance 
or choice, read this journal, it will not, for themselves 
alone, be entirely devoid of interest. Besides, it may 
perhaps be of some service to them after my days upon 
the earth shall be numbered, because it is my purpose tc 
speak pointedly and distinctively of each and every one 
of them, and of their different characteristics. 

“At this very time I have five children living and one 
in the grave,—four girls and one boy, whose name is Al¬ 
phonse. He is now far away from me, beginning his 
classical studies at Lyons. He is a very good and amia¬ 
ble child. May God make him truthful, just, wise, and 
pious ! For him, my youthful son, I most humbly offer 
up to Heaven this heartfelt prayer with all the ardor of 
my soul. My eldest daughter is named Cecilia. She is 
seven and a half years old, and is extremely quick and 
blithesome. Her disposition and ways are truly sweet 
and winsome. Eugenia, her sister, is five and a half 
years old. She evinces an unusual susceptibility of na¬ 
ture, and is possessed of an excellent heart. Cesarine is 
two years old. Suzanne is a tender little plant, only nine 
months of age, and her I am still nursing. 

“The proper education and training of these four 
daughters will certainly be no small task. Were it not 
for God’s help, in whom I put all my trust, I should at 
once despair of ever being able to accomplish it; but it 
seems as if I may do almost anything and everything 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


57 


through Him who strengthens me, and who is sometimes 
pleased to manifest His power and glory in certain of the 
very weakest of His creatures. ... In addition to the 
several members of my own family at home, I have with 
me an infirm female relative, very feeble in both body 
and mind. Duties of kinship would seem to require me 
to look after her as my sixth child, and to treat her with 
the same degree of care and tenderness that I am accus¬ 
tomed to bestow on my own precious baby at the breast. 
Besides all these, there are in and about the house six 
servants, upon every one of whom I have to keep a con¬ 
stant eye. O helpful Heaven, how much need have I of 
thy assistance ! 

“My husband and myself live almost always at Milly, 
where I am, with rare exceptions, delighted to be. At 
no great distance from Milly we have recently acquired 
another place, Saint Point. This also is a good property, 
situated in an agreeable, pleasant country, where, at our 
option, we can enjoy any amount of retirement and soli¬ 
tude behind the mountains. What a full measure of 
gratitude do we not owe to Providence! 

“ My sister (Madame de Vaux) has arrived to-day 
from Lyons. By nature, and without any effort on her 
own part, she is truly of an angelic sweetness, and of far 
more than the average merit among the women of her 
time. She has brought me tidings of my Alphonse. His 
teachers speak well of him. God bless him, as I bless 
him from the very depths of my heart! To-morrow, in 
the capacity of both mother and teacher, I am to begin 
to give lessons to my little girls. I shall have need of 
much patience and assiduity. 

“After dinner a neighbor came to tell me that a poor, 
half-forsaken old man, who lived in a hut in the moun¬ 
tain,’ where he had only a goat for companionship, and 
c* 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


58 

whose general wants I had long supplied, had just died. 
I was much grieved at this intelligence, and severely 
reproached myself for having neglected for several days 
to visit the indigent recluse. Yet my failure to see him 
was because of his being so far away. It is true that I 
supposed he had recovered from the particular illness of 
which I knew he was suffering ; yet, considering his age, 
I ought not to have relied so implicitly on this. I feel 
now that it was my duty to take better care of him. My 
heart accuses and reproves me. I suffer compunctions of 
conscience. In truth, I have not enough perseverance in 
the little amount of good that I am enabled to do. I 
tire too quickly and too often in well-doing. With too 
great facility I allow myself to be overcome by these 
spells of absent-mindedness and weariness, which, if they 
be not faults, are yet weaknesses; and these are preju¬ 
dicial to a holy use of time. For to what end has time 
itself been given to us ? Was it not given that we might 
at least diligently and faithfully try, every day and every 
hour, to bring something good to God, to others, and to 
ourselves? . . . 

“ This evening my husband, my two eldest daughters, 
and myself took a walk together through our vineyards, 
now in full bloom, and the whole air was delightfully 
perfumed with their fragrance. Our vineyards bring us 
the only income we have for ourselves, for our children, 
for our servants, and for the poor of our neighborhood, 
who frequently come to us for favors. If but one-half of 
the beautiful and fragrant blossoms before our eyes will 
only yield us good grapes, we shall be quite fortunate 
this year. May Providence preserve them from the vio¬ 
lent and destructive hail-storms which are not uncommon 
in France at this season ! 

“ Continuing our walk, we went by the lonely little 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


59 

hut, above our vineyards, where the poor old man died 
this morning. I desired to go in to see him once more 
and to pray by his bedside; but my husband thought it 
best that I should not do so, as he wished to shield from 
the eyes of myself and our little ones a spectacle which 
would inevitably have made a very sad impression upon 
us. I really felt like asking pardon of the soul of the 
lifeless hermit for not having been there to repeat to him 
words of hope and of comfort during his agony, and to 
listen respectfully and sympathetically to his last sigh. 
The door was open, and his bereaved goat did nothing 
but go in and out excitedly, bleating mournfully all the 
while, as if imploring help in its own distress. The abso¬ 
lute disconsolateness of the poor animal caused us all to 
weep. I asked and obtained the consent of my husband 
that we should send for it in the morning, after the 
burial, and that we should give it a good home with our 
cow and the two little sheep belonging to the children.” 

In these first pages of the first volume of this little 
journal we get something more than a mere glimpse of 
the daily life of this young woman, previously educated 
in the superb residences of the richest prince in Europe, 
and afterward transplanted, by the love which she enter¬ 
tained for her husband and children, far into the country, 
where we find her and them, in the most straitened cir¬ 
cumstances, at a distance of three hundred miles from 
Paris. Should any one desire an exact idea of the little 
house at Milly, where my mother had secluded herself, in 
both winter and summer, in the regular and happy dis¬ 
charge of her domestic duties, he may find a prosaic de¬ 
scription of it in my own confidential writings, and also 
a poetic description in one of my metrical harmonies, 
entitled “ My Native Land.” Here follows what I said 
about it eighteen years ago in my “ Confidences” : 


6o 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


XXII. 

“ Leaving the right bank of the river Saone, which 
runs through the middle of the green meadows, and 
meanders along the fertile hillocks, of Macon, and going 
in the direction of that town, and toward the ruins of 
the old Abbey of Cluny, where Abelard died, one follows 
an uneven route over the undulations of a soil which soon 
begins to magnify itself to the eye like the first waves of 
a swelling sea. To the right and to the left may be seen 
a goodly number of white hamlets in the midst of the 
various vineyards. Above these hamlets, bare and uncul¬ 
tivated mountains, of unattractive altitude, extend them¬ 
selves in the forms of sloping planes and gray lawns, 
where one perceives, like white specks, a few sheep of 
rare size and superior quality. All the mountains here¬ 
about are crowned with rugged and abrupt rocks, which 
are partly imbedded in the earth, and whose curious 
notches, caused by the fantastic disintegrations of time, 
present to the eye the quaint forms and fissures of old dis¬ 
mantled castles. Following the route that leads along 
the base of the hills most prominently in view, one enters, 
on the left side, a narrow little path, shaded by willows. 
Further on, meadows appear on either side of a swift- 
murmuring stream whose dammed-up waters, a mile lower 
down, turn perpetually the wheels of a grist-mill. 

“ Our road now winds, for a moment, under the alder- 
bushes, by the side of the rivulet which here, in times of 
freshets, overflows its banks, and inundates the road, to 
so great a depth as to become temporarily impassable. 
Now, however, we cross the water easily and pleasantly 
over a little bridge, and then go forward, gradually ascend¬ 
ing a winding way until we arrive in sight of a number of 
small houses covered with red tiles, which we see grouped 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


61 


above us upon a table-land of limited area. That is our 
village. A steeple of gray stone, in the form of a pyra¬ 
mid, rises perceptibly above only seven or eight of the 
humble habitations of the people. The rocky road zig¬ 
zags from door to door between the cottages. At the end 
of our road we come to a gate, somewhat larger than 
most of the others which we have just passed. This gate 
is the opening to a grove and a court-yard, at the further 
end of which is secluded my father’s house. 

“The house is, indeed, quite hidden away; for one 
can see it neither from the one side nor from the other; 
neither from the village nor from the high-road. Built 
in the bowl of a large curve in the border of the valley, 
and overlooked by the steeple, by the roofs of the rustic 
structures, and by the trees, and, withal, being under the 
shadow of a moderately high mountain, it is only by 
climbing up the mountain, and by then stopping and 
looking back, that we can see, down below us, this low 
but massive house which, at the extremity of a narrow 
garden, takes upon itself the appearance of a large land¬ 
mark of dark-colored stone. 

“ The house is square. It has only one story above the 
entrance. There are three large windows on each side. 
The walls are not plastered. The rain and the moss have 
combined to impart to the stones the quaint and sombre 
aspect of the cloisters of an old abbey. On the side of 
the court-yard we enter, the house through an elaborately 
carved wooden door. This door is placed over a large 
stoop of five steps' of freestone. But the stones of the 
stoop, though of unusually large size, have been so badly 
broken off at the corners, so deeply worn away on the 
upper surfaces, and so generally cracked and split by time 
and usage, that they are now quite disunited and rickety; 
so that, while walking over them, one hears under the 


6 2 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


I 

feet a hollow and uncertain sound. Out of the wider 
fissures of these stones grow nettles and wallworts; and 
the little summer frogs, with their voices so sweet and 
melancholy, sing there at night as merrily as if they were 
in a swamp. 

Our first entrance is into a spacious and well-lighted 
corridor, whose width, however, is diminished by large 
closets and cupboards of carved walnut, wherein are kept 
the linen of the household and the bags of flour and 
grain necessary for the daily wants of the family. To 
the left is the kitchen, whose door, always open, shows 
a long oaken table surrounded by benches. It is but 
seldom, indeed, that one may not see seated at the table 
some countrymen at any and all hours of the day, for the 
table-cloth is always spread, if not for the workmen, then 
for the innumerable and unexpected guests, to whom, in 
a country like this, away from towns, and where there are 
neither hotels nor other public houses, it is customary 
to offer bread and cheese. To the left we go into the 
dining-room. Nothing decorates this apartment but a 
pine table, a few chairs, and a sideboard with divisions, 
drawers, and numerous shelves ; this last-mentioned arti¬ 
cle of furniture being a thing hereditary in almost all the 
old homesteads of France, and which the taste of the 
present times has rendered even more fashionable than 
ever before, by creating for them a brisk and universal 
demand. From the dining-room we step into the parlor, 
which has two windows, one of which opens upon the 
yard, while the other, on the north side, opens upon the 
garden. A wooden staircase, which my father afterward 
had replaced with one of stones roughly cut, takes us up 
into the second and last story, which is low and dingy. 
Here we find ten small rooms, almost without furniture, 
opening within upon dark passage-ways. These rooms 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 63 

were used as sleeping-apartments for the family, for the 
guests, and for the domestics. 

“ Such is the interior of the house which has sheltered 
us for so long a time within its warm but sombre walls. 
Such is the castle—if castle it may be called—which 
my mother with so much love denominated her Jerusa¬ 
lem, her mansion of peace. Such is the domicile in 
which, during childhood and youth, we were tenderly 
and lovingly protected from the rain, from cold, from 
hunger, from the blasts of winter, and from rough col¬ 
lision with the world. Such is the abode where death 
came to take by turns the father and the mother, and 
from where the children have successively taken flight; 
these for one place; those for another; some for eter¬ 
nity. . . . 

“ Preciously do I preserve whatever still remains of 
this old homestead, even the straw, the grass, and the 
moss; and although the house is now vacant, deserted 
and chilled, and devoid of all those affectionate words and 
caresses which animated it of yore, yet I always have a 
melancholy pleasure in seeing it again. Even yet I take 
delight in sleeping there sometimes, because on waking, 
every now and then, it seems to me as if I can hear my 
mother’s voice, my father’s footsteps, my sister’s joy¬ 
ful songs, and all those innocent and cheerful noises of 
youth, of life and of love, which now resound for me 
alone under the old beams, and which have, alas, in these 
later times, no one left but myself to bear testimony to 
the rareness of their harmony and sweetness. 

XXIII. 

“ The exterior of the house corresponds with its in¬ 
terior. On the side of the yard the view extends unin¬ 
terruptedly only to the wine-presses, the fuel-houses, and 


6 4 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


the stables. The gate of the yard, being always open to 
the street of the village, shows, from morning till night, 
the peasants going to or returning from their fields of 
labor. These tillers of the soil carry their implements 
on one shoulder, and sometimes on the other a long 
cradle or basket in which is sleeping one of their younger 
children. The wife follows her husband to the vineyard, 
carrying her baby at her breast. A nanny-goat, with her 
little kid, follows after them. The kid stops a moment 
to play with the dogs, near the gate, and then bounds 
back to rejoin its mother. 

“On the other side of the street there is a lime-kiln 
which is always smoking, and which is a place of general 
resort for old men, for poor spinning-women, and for 
idle children, who warm and amuse themselves by its 
fire, which is never extinguished. This is all that we 
can see from one of the parlor windows. 

“The other window, opening to the north, permits 
our eyes to glance over the walls of the garden, and to 
rest upon the tiles of a number of small houses beyond. 
Still further onward we observe, in the distance, a horizon 
of dull-colored mountains, which are almost always 
cloudy, and from which, in one place lighted up by the 
rays of a brilliant sun and in another shaded by angular 
masses of moving fog, there not unfrequently arise, in 
appearance, new cities in progress and old castles in 
ruins. These are characteristic traits of this landscape; 
and but for the deceptive and fantastic figures thus pre¬ 
sented by the clouds, and but for the clouds themselves, 
there would be before our eyes only a black mountain 
and a yellowish ravine. A stage-coach on a plain, a 
windmill on a hillock, is in itself a landscape. The 
earth is only a theatre for observation and action; the 
thought, the drama, and even life itself, in all its phases. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


65 


are precisely as man himself makes them. Wherever 
there is life there is interest. 

“ The rear of the house adjoins the garden, which is a 
small inclosure of brown earth of the fourth of an acre. 
At the further corner of the garden the mountain begins 
to rise imperceptibly; the nearer part of which is cul¬ 
tivated and green, with occasional vineyards; but at a 
point more distant it is wild, rough, and unproductive, 
yielding little else than detached tufts of moss, which, 
with the least quantity of fertile soil, grow upon the rocks 
and scarcely attract attention. At the summit of the 
mountain a slight indentation is apparent. Not a tree, 
not even a shrub, rises above the few sprigs of heath which 
grow over it. Not a cot, not even a curl of smoke, im¬ 
parts to it a sign of life. It is so barren, so desolate! 
Yet, who knows but that these very defects of nature con¬ 
stitute, in part at least, the secret charm of this garden? 
It is somewhat like a child’s cradle which the wife of the 
laborer has placed in a deep furrow of the field while she 
works. The two sides of the furrow hide the sides of the 
cradle, and when the curtain is lifted the child can see 
only a vertical part of the sky between the two undula¬ 
tions of the ground. 

“ With regard to the garden itself, as a garden, it is 
worthy of little else than the name. It could never have 
been fitly called a garden except in those primitive days 
when Homer described the modest inclosure and the 
seven prairies of the old man Laertes. Eight diminutive 
beds of vegetables, cut at right angles; bordered by fruit 
trees; separated by alleys of common herbs and yellow 
sand; at the extremity of these alleys, to the north, eight 
tortuous trunks of old y6ke-elms, which form a gloomy 
arbor over a wooden bench; another smaller bower near 
the further left-hand corner of the garden, interwoven 

6 * 


66 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


with running vines of Judea, under two tall cherry-trees; 
all these things constitute the principal features of the in¬ 
closure; they make up the garden. Just here, however, 
I was about to forget to mention something else not alto¬ 
gether out of place in this connection; yet I do not 
allude to a murmuring spring, on the one hand, nor even 
to a noiseless well, with its damp and greenish stones, on 
the other. On no part of the earth around me is thfcre 
one drop of water, save only in the little reservoirs ex¬ 
cavated by my father in the solid rocks to receive the 
showers of rain. Around these pools of green and stag¬ 
nant water there are twelve sycamores and several plane- 
trees, which overshadow a corner of the garden behind 
the walls, and which cover with their large yellow leaves 
the scummy surface of the basin. 

“Yes, these are all the mentionable things that were 
there; only these, and nothing more. Yet these humble 
possessions were amply sufficient during a long period of 
years to secure the contentment and happiness, to brighten 
the day-dreams and to sweeten the hours of labor and 
leisure and sleep of a father, of a mother, and of eight 
children ! And this is the property which still suffices to 
awaken the most endearing and delightful memories in 
the breasts of the surviving members of the family. To 
them this property is the very Eden of their childhood, 
where their most placid thoughts always take shelter when¬ 
ever they wish to refresh themselves again with a few 
drops of the morning dew of life, or to bask once more 
in the genial rays of that beam of natal light which shines 
pure and resplendent for man only around the first sites 
and scenes of his cradle. 

“ There is not in that garden a tree, a shrub, or a 
flower which is not inlaid in my very .soul as if it were a 
part of it! To most of us yet surviving, this piece of 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


67 


ground seems immense; even in such small space so much 
does it contain for us of precious things and memories. 
The frail wooden fence, always rickety and broken, which 
admitted us there, and over which we would precipitate 
ourselves with cries of joy; the upraised beds of lettuce, 
which had been subdivided for us into so many tiny gar¬ 
dens and which we ourselves cultivated; the plane-tree, 
at the base of which our father used to sit down, with his 
dogs at his feet, on his return from the chase; the alley, 
where our gentle -mother would take her walks at sunset, 
often whispering in an undertone the monotonous prayers 
which fixed her thoughts on God, while with her heart 
and eyes she drew us all fondly to herself; the grass-plot 
in the shade on the north side for the warm summer days ; 
the little inner wall protected from the cool winds of 
autumn, where in mid-day we would range ourselves, with 
our books in hand, and read in the sunshine; the three 
lilacs ; the two hazel-bushes; the strawberries seen through 
the leaves of their plants; the plums; the pears; the 
luscious peaches found in the morning, under the trees, 
all sticky with their golden gum, and wet with dew; the 
clump of elms, where each of us, especially myself, would 
go at noon to read in peace his favorite books, and to re¬ 
flect upon the various impressions which would arise in us, 
respectively, from a perusal of those volumes; the recol¬ 
lection of the intimate conversations held here or held 
there in such and such alleys of the garden; and the par¬ 
ticular places where we would say good-by whenever any 
of us would leave for a long time; the spot where we 
would meet again on our return; where occurred occa¬ 
sionally some of those intimate and pathetic scenes of the 
drama of the family; where now and then we saw our 
father’s countenance become darker ; where our mother 
wept on forgiving us our faults, when we would fall on our 


68 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


knees, hiding our guilty faces in her dress; where they 
told her of the death of a beloved daughter, our angel- 
sister; where she would lift up her eyes and hands so 
reverently and resignedly toward heaven;—all these images, 
all these ideas, all these emotions, all these groups, all 
these figures, all these raptures, all these tender caresses, 
still haunt for us this little inclosure, as they have haunted 
it, vivified it, and enchanted it during so many days, the 
shortest and sweetest of days; and, taking into account 
our since scattered existence, we might in these very 
alleys wrap ourselves around, so to speak, with this soil, 
with these trees, and with these plants, which grew up 
with us, and could wish that the universe itself had begun 
and ended for us within the walls of this inextensive 
domain! 

“ This paternal garden has even yet the same general 
aspect. The trees, grown somewhat old, are beginning 
to cover their trunks with specks of moss. The borders 
of the beds of roses and carnations have encroached upon 
the sand and narrowed the foot-paths. These borders 
now trail their longer filaments where the feet become 
entangled. Two nightingales, perched on or about their 
nests, still sing during the summer nights. The three 
pine-trees which, when very young and small, were 
planted by my mother, still weave and waft through 
their branches the same melodious breezes. The setting 
sun shines upon the clouds with undiminished brilliancy. 
One enjoys the same soothing silence, which is inter¬ 
rupted only in the morning and evening by the ringing 
of the village bell at prayer-time, or by the monotonous 
and drowsy cadence of the flails in the hands of the 
thrashers who beat out the wheat on the barn floors. 
Parasitic herbs, briers, and large blue-mallows rise in 
thick bunches among the rose-bushes. The ivy thickens 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


69 

its leafy and wide-spread draperies against the walls. It 
grows more and more dense every year about the closed 
windows of my mother’s chamber; and when by chance 
I find myself walking thereabout, I soon become wrapt in 
contemplation, and am only enticed away from my en¬ 
chanting reverie and solitude by the familiar footsteps of 
an old vine-dresser, who. was employed as a gardener in 
the days of our childhood, and who comes now, from 
time to time, to visit and nurture his plants, as I do my 
sad recollections, my regrets, and my phantoms.” 

Here follow, in verse, some of the lines with which I 
endeavored to describe this very same place, at a period 
when my absence from France rendered all its images 
and objects more aerial by distance: 

THE OLD HOMESTEAD AT MILLY. 

There is upon the earth a mountain bare, 

Which hath on its sides neither thicket nor stream, 

And whose humble summit, eroded by time, 

Yields gradually to the eye a lower horizon. 

Divested of the soil which once top-covered the clay, 

Scarcely doth one solitary shrub outthrow its roots; 

Overspread is the surface with rocks, almost ready to fall, 

Prone to velocity under the light steps of the kid ; 

From age to age these fragments by their fall have formed 
A rough declivity, which, step by step, slowly decreaseth 
As one approacheth the rude walls against which they rest. 

Here a few niggardly fields have given to our labor 

Some stunted vines, whose branches, in vain seeking upright support, 

Are wound about on the ground, or entwined on the gravel. 

Also several raspberry-bushes, where the children of the hamlets 
Pick the forgotten fruit, for which they contend with the birds; 

And on the leaves of which a lean ewe doth passively browse, 
Bedecking the thorns with her white wool as a tribute. 

There are places in which neither the quiet murmuring of waters, 

Nor the gentle quivering of the leaves of the forest, 


7 ° 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Nor the genial carol of the melodious nightingale, 

Doth ever touch the heart, or enchant the ear; 

But in which, under the rays of an ever-bright sun, 

The lively locust doth deafen with an ear-piercing cry. 

There is in this desert a rude and sombre dwelling, 

Which the mountain doth shield with its shade, 

And whose walls, beaten by the rain and the winds, 

Bear their age plainly written on their mosses grown gray. 

On the three disjointed stone steps of the threshold 
Chance hath well planted the roots of an ivy, 

Which increaseth a hundredfold its twisted knots, 

And hideth under its long branches the abuses of time ; 

And its rustic spiral twigs, bending back like an arch, 

Make conspicuous the only ornament of the porch. 

A garden which doth occupy the slope of the hill 
Presenteth to the west a sand-bank unmingled with moisture; 
Stones without cement, dyed black with long winters, 

Do solemnly bound this contracted inclosure ; 

The ground which the spade opens every spring 
Shows there its bare earth, without stem, without stock; 
Neither variegated flower-beds, nor arches of verdure, 

Nor the freshness of purling brooks rippling along; 

Only seven linden shrubs, forgotten by the mattock, 

Give shelter to the grass which grows beneath them. 

And there, shedding in autumn a warm and soft shade, 
Thrice grateful to the feelings under a cloudless sky, 

Are the trees under whose branches, in my happy childhood, 
I would sleep, and had many most pleasurable dreams. 

Within the rustic inclosure, which thirsts for the dews, 

Is a rock-walled well, deep hiding its waters, 

Where an old man draws, after many strained efforts, 

His bucket brim-full, which he adjusts in its place. 

A thrashing-floor where the flails, falling fast on the sheaves, 
Harmoniously disengage the grain from the straw; 

Where the white pigeon and the dun-colored sparrow 
Contend for the wheat-heads uncaught by the rake. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


7 


Scattered here on the ground are many wrecks of the farm ; 

Broken yokes, idle carts, old wagons, standing under the sheds, 

The hubs and spokes of weak wheels weighed down in the rut, 

And blunt ploughshares worn dull by the furrows. 

Nothing relieves the eye from its barren boundary, 

Neither the gilded domes of a magnificent city, 

Nor the dusty road, nor far-distant river, 

Nor neighboring roofs glittering beneath the morning dew. 

Only humble huts, here and there dotting the landscape, 

Appear as rude and dispirited habitations of poverty; 

These along the foot-paths, in disorder located, 

Show forth their smoked walls and thatched roofs. 

Here an old man, seated at the door of his dwelling, 

Rocks his fretful child in a willow-twig cradle. 

In verity, a soil without shade, and with colorless sky, 

Mountains without moisture, and valleys without verdure,— 

These are the regions, the sites, and the landmarks. 

Whose strange images my soul doth forever evoke. 

Here always, even at night, my peaceful dreams 
Construct scenes and views familiar to mine eyes. 

Here every hour of the day, every aspect of the mountains, 

Every sound in the twilight coming up from the vale, 

Every month which returns as the seer of the seasons, 

Advances to flush or to fade the woods and the grass, 

The pale moon which departs and hides away in the west, 

The bright star which ascends above the smoky horizon, 

The hungry cattle, repelled by the frosts of great altitudes, 
Descending, step by step, from high hill to low valley, 

The whistling winds, the budding roses, the green grass and the dry. 
The ploughshare in the furrow; the water in the meadow,— 
Everything here speaks to me in language of loving accents, 

Whose words, understood by the sense and the soul, 

Are melodies, perfumes, thunderbolts, tempests, 

Rocks, torrents, and images familiarly sweet. 

Slumbering deep in my breast were these old recollections, 

All newly aroused by the sight of one object at home, 


7 2 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Where once again my heart findeth itself in every place, 

Everything remembers me, everything knows me, everything loves me, 
Mine eyes behold friends all along the loved landscape, 

Each tree has a history, and each stone a name. 

What matters it if this name, unlike Thebes or Palmyra, 

Does not recall to one's mind the pomp of a kingdom, 

Or human blood shed through the ambition of tyrants, 

The scourges of God whom foolish men call great ? 

This site, where thoughts are again flushed with new life, 

These places yet filled with the archives of my soul, 

Are to me far greater than the fields of destiny, 

Wherein did rise, wherein did fall, some tottering empire. 

What is good, what is evil, the soul only can measure; 

Quick beats the heart over the ruins of an humble hovel, 

But under the imposing monuments of heroes and of gods 

The heedless shepherd passes by, whistling, turning from them his eyes. 

There is the rustic bench where often my father would sit, 

The hall where his manly and commanding voice resounded, 

When the laborers, seated on their overturned ploughshares, 

Recounted to him how many furrows were made every hour; 

Or else, still palpitating with the scenes of his glory, 

He would tell us the history of kings and the scaffold, 

And, flushed with the great battles in which he had fought, 

On narrating his life, he inculcated truth, justice, and virtue. 

There is the vacant place where my mother, at all hours, 

At the slightest petition would come out of the house, 

Bringing on her blest arms the bread and the raiment 
Wherewith she would feed the hungry and clothe the poor. 

There are the thatched roofs, where, with ever kind hands, 

She poured into the wounds of the tenants either oil or honey. 

Where, opening by the bedside of expiring old people 
The Book wherein hope is vouchsafed to the dying, 

And from their languishing lips gently receiving their sighs, 

She would teach them to turn their last thoughts toward God. 

And, holding by the hands the two youngest of us, 

To the poor mendicant widow, fallen down on her knees, 

Would say to her, wiping the tears from her eyes, 

“ I give you a little silver, give them back your prayers!’' 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


73 


There is a seat in the shade, where her foot would rock us, 

The branch of the fig-tree that her hand would bend down. 

Here is the narrow path which, when the matin bell 
In the distant temple pealed forth its loud tones, 

Led us straight onward to the altar of Jehovah, 

To offer there two incenses pure, Innocence and Happiness. 

Here it was that the voice of our pious mother 
Explained to us a God, whom we felt in herself! 

Here also she showed us the grain hid away in its germ ; 

The grape naturally distilling its delightful beverage ; 

The cow into pure milk changing the juices of plants; 

The rocks partly opened for the outgushing of waters ; 

The wool of the sheep, caught and plucked by the briers, 
Serving to line and adorn the cosy nests of the birds. 

Further she showed us the sun, so true to its zodiac points, 
Giving to the zones their climates, their seasons, their hours ; 
And the glittering stars of night, which God alone can count; 
Worlds toward which the thought hardly dares to take flight. 

Through love and gratitude she taught us to exercise faith, 

And even in our simplest childhood led us to know 
How the orb and the insect, though to our eyes invisible, 

Have yet, as we, a great Father in heaven. 

These heaths, these fields, these vineyards, and these meadows, 
Have all their sweet recollections, including their shades; 
There played my sisters; and the wind, as they frolicked, 
Would follow them, sporting with their light golden hair. 

There, guiding the shepherds to the tops of the hills, 

I would kindle the bonfires of dry wood and of thorns; 

While, my eyes gazing intently at the glare of the flame, 

I passed hour after hour in admiring the tremulous blaze. 

There, yielding to the fury of the swift and powerful wind, 
Before us the hollow old willow prostrated its trunk; 

Whilst I hearkened to the whistling among its dead leaves, 
And to the blasts whose sounds my soul doth still retain. 

D 7 


74 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


There is the maple-tree, which, overhanging the abyss, 

In the season of nests, would swing the birds on its top; 

Also the ponds in the meadows, whose sleeping waters 

Floated our frail boats, which were made of reeds. 

v 

The oak-tree, the rock, the mill near the mountain, 

And the wall of inclosure, where, during the summer, 

I would sit on the stones by the side of the old men, 

Watching the waning day with my lingering looks. 

There everything is standing yet; everything springs up in its place; 
Still can we see in the sand the signs of our footsteps ; 

Nothing is wanting in these haunts but a heart to enjoy them ; 

Yet, alas, it is late, and swift time is now speeding away 1 

Far from the paternal home, like leaves on the ground, 

Life hath scattered the children away from their mother; 

And this dear hearth resembles now the old nests 

From which the swallows have been absent all the long winter. 

Already the grass, which grows about the old flagstones, 

Fringes fairly the rough edges and effaces the footprints; 

And the down-running ivy, infolded like a cloak of mourning, 

Covers the window in part and encroaches on the threshold. 

Soon, perhaps, . . . O my God, dispel this sad foreboding! 

Soon, perhaps, a stranger, quite unknown in the village. 

With gold in his pockets, will possess himself of these places, 

Which the shades of our ancestors occupy for us ; 

And from which our recollections of cradles and tombs 
Will vanish at his voice, like a nest of young doves, 

Which know not how to find rest, when their tree 
In the forest hath been cut down by the axe! 

I must here ask the pardon of my sisters and nephews 
and nieces for having taken pleasure in copying over again 
the foregoing verses in this journal; but they will not 
sound harshly to them, for they are likewise fruit of the 
same sap. Let us now open again my mother’s manu¬ 
script. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


75 


XXIV. 

"June 16, 1801. 

“ Yesterday I was so greatly fatigued, after an excur¬ 
sion to Saint Point, made half the way on foot and half 
the way on the back of a donkey,—for the roads were 
otherwise impassable,—that I did not feel able to write 
down any fact or incident connected with our trip, which 
was, however, very pleasant. We walked about a great 
deal, enjoying ourselves; and in the evening I took my 
daughters to church, where I prayed God to bless us. I 
returned many devout thanks to Him for having given us 
this estate, upon which my husband did not count. Yet 
the building itself is very much dilapidated; all the walls 
are bare, and the coat of arms and the fire-places, which 
were broken with iron bars by the ruffians of 1789, are 
still unmended. There is nothing about it in the least 
calculated to flatter one’s vanity. So much the better, 
though, for I have too much already. Everything smiles 
upon me,—the country in all its greenness and greatness, 
our relatives, our friends, our neighbors, and the poorer 
peasants of the vicinage, who are always at my door, as if 
I were Providence itself! In general I am but too happy; 
sometimes it alarms me, for, as a rule, whenever any situ¬ 
ation or condition in life is so very enjoyable and satisfac¬ 
tory as the present, it does not last long in this low world. 
I must, indeed, begin to fortify myself against the danger 
of an excess of pride and pleasure, and not permit myself 
to be overjoyed save only through a feeling of gratitude 
toward the Divine Dispensator for those dreary days of 
adversity which subjected me to so much wholesome 
dilemma and discipline.” 


7 6 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


XXV. 

" June 17, 1801. 

“ My sister-in-law, Mademoiselle de Lamartine, whom I 
love very much, gave us an excellent dinner to-day at the 
mansion of Monceau, which she owns undividedly with 
my husband’s eldest brother, Monsieur de Lamartine, the 
head of the family. Neither the one nor the other would 
ever consent to marry. Yet certain attachments of the 
heart were the cause of this resolution on their part. 
Monsieur de Lamartine, destined by the law of primogeni¬ 
ture to possess alone the immense fortune of the family, 
loved Mademoiselle de Saint Huruge, who, however, was 
not thought rich enough for him. He preferred remain¬ 
ing a bachelor all his days rather than marry one whom 
he did not love. Mademoiselle de Saint Huruge is too 
old now ever to think of marrying at all in this world. 
She is the sister of the famous Saint Huruge, so cele¬ 
brated as one of the leading demagogues of the self-styled 
tribune during the political disturbances at Paris in the 
months of June and October. He is, like Mirabeau, a 
nobleman who has given himself wholly and frantically 
to the cause of the Revolution. He is not a bad man; 
so far from it, he is even generous, affable, and obliging. 
He calls himself a royalist ; but in relation to the affairs 
of government he is often beside himself, and as if in a 
delirium. I think it was his notorious reputation, and the 
inauspicious glitter of his name, that prevented my brother- 
in-law from marrying Mademoiselle de Saint Huruge. She 
herself is good, sweet, pious, interesting. One can see 
all over her features the traces of an attractive beauty, 
veiled with thoughtful sadness. My brother-in-law and 
she see each other every evening at Macon in the family 
drawing-room, and seem yet to have for each other the 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


77 


purest and most unalterable friendship. Monsieur de 
Lamartine is a man of the greatest merit; very well in¬ 
formed, even learned, they say, in the natural sciences; 
writes with talent and effect, is greatly esteemed, and is 
very much consulted by all the political parties of the 
country. In a word, and in fact, he is the most eminent 
man in the province. His bad health alone prevented 
him from accepting the nomination as a representative of 
the nobility in the General Assembly. Later he would 
have been nominated to the National Convention by the 
conservative Republicans, if he had not persistently kept 
himself back by foreseeing the great excesses into which 
the Convention would be thrown by the demagogues. 

“ After suffering several months in prison for having 
merely avowed his sentiments as a Conservative, Mon¬ 
sieur de Lamartine has again come into the possession 
of his property, and lives in the castle of Monceau, in 
summer, with his sister. This devoted and affectionate 
sister has entirely consecrated herself to God and to her 
brother. She was created to make a husband happy. 
She was as graceful as she was sweet; this any one may 
still perceive by her face, which is all goodness. It is 
said in the family that, before the Revolution, she had 
a requited attachment for Monsieur de Marigny, a very 
fascinating gentleman, who was a distinguished poet and 
musician, a neighbor, and a sort of third-cousin relative. 

Monsieur de Marigny emigrated to Italy in 1791; his 
estates were confiscated; he came back only to die in 
a hospital, at Macon, in 1799. After his death, Made¬ 
moiselle de Lamartine would never listen in the least to 
any proposition of marriage. Her countenance is always 
clouded by a shade of sweet and impressive melancholy. 
It is believed that she has secretly made religious vows, 
although she remains in the world unconnected with any 

7 * 


78 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


holy sisterhood. She has added her own fortune, which 
is considerable, to that of her brother, and spends most 
of it in works of benevolence and charity. The manage¬ 
ment of her house, combined with meditation and prayer, 
and acts of goodness toward the unfortunate, occupy her 
whole time. In verity, she is a saint, but yet a saint 
without pretension, and without austerity, whom only to 
see, or to be near by, is in itself a blessing. She seems 
to love me sincerely, and I never fail to be edified by 
what she says and does whenever we pass a day together.’* 

xxvi. 

"June 19, 1801. 

“To-day I have reflected still more seriously on the 
danger of frivolous reading. I incline to the opinion 
that I would do well to deprive myself entirely of such 
questionable literature ; for, since it is generally regarded 
as one of the pleasures of the world, it would be a sacri¬ 
fice, or self-denial, which could hardly be otherwise than 
acceptable to our heavenly Father. Besides, when I am 
diverted by one of these light yet captivating volumes, 
those that are more meritorious and useful make me 
weary; and yet I am aware that I need to peruse more 
serious and profound books, in order to become better 
qualified to instruct my children properly. For their 
sake, then, I have at last decided to deny myself the 
pleasure, if pleasure it be, of mere trivial reading. 

“Yesterday I received a letter from my mother, who is 
now in Germany. She does not mention the particular 
place where she is sojourning. I think she is still with 
the Princess of Orleans, and that she is engaged in the 
delicate business of arranging a marriage for this noble 
young lady. May God protect my mother in her pilgrim¬ 
age, and bless her in her misfortunes !” . . . 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


79 


In order to become well acquainted with this passage 
of the journal, one must be aware, and must not forget, 
that Madame de Roy, my mother’s mother, was under¬ 
governess of the children of the Duke of Orleans, before 
the time when Madame de Genlis was appointed upper- 
governess of these same children. After the execu¬ 
tion of the Duke of Orleans, and the dispersion of his 
family beyond the confines of France, Madame de Roy, 
my grandmother (the rival of Madame de Genlis), was 
still devoted by the most tender attachments to the 
Duchess of Orleans, daughter of the Duke of Penthievre, 
and had been summoned from France to Spain, where 
this noble lady, widow of Philippe the Elder, had taken 
refuge, with the sanction of the Convention. Madame 
de Genlis, being suspected and disliked by the Duchess 
of Orleans, had been removed; and Madame de Roy 
was commissioned to go abroad for the Princess of Or¬ 
leans, her old pupil, who was then in a convent of Swit¬ 
zerland or Germany, where she had sought and found 
safety and rest, but whence it was thought best that she 
should be induced to return to her mother, in Spain. It 
was this princess, very young then, and very distinguished 
for the exalted characteristics of her heart and mind, who 
afterward became so well known as Madame Adelaide, 
and who exerted, it is said, great political influence under 
the reign of her brother, Louis Philippe. My mother 
was under the impression that it was a question or matter 
of marriage for this princess; but the chief object of the 
journey of Madame de Roy was to wean away the noble 
young lady from the influence of Madame de Genlis, and 
from participating in the political proceedings of what 
they then called the party of Orleans, and, withal, to 
coax her back to Spain. The Duchess of Orleans, widow 
of Philippe the Elder, had for a long time past been 


8o 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


alienated from the public policy of her husband. She 
had never taken part in the secret and revolutionary 
schemes of the party of Orleans in Paris, nor in the 
ambitious and dynastic plots of this same party in the 
army of Dumouriez, where Madame de Genlis had taken 
her pupil. In the palaces of intrigue, the duchess was 
beauty, candor, and virtue itself. The court of Spain 
honored in her the double victim of the inexcusable mis¬ 
conduct of her husband and of the terrible proscriptions 
of the Revolution. 


XXVII. 

-"July 3, 1801. 

“ Yesterday we took up our residence here,—at Saint 
Point. I had a great deal of trouble throughout the 
whole day in establishing all my little world within it. 
Before sundown I was very tired. In the evening I went 
to say my prayers in the church, which adjoins the garden. 
On crossing the cemetery, I noticed two men digging a 
grave, which caused me to reflect upon the transitory 
nothingness of this world, for which most of us manifest 
such infinite concern. I witnessed the burial. A young 
girl, daughter of the man who had died, on hearing 
the first shovelful of earth fall upon her father’s coffin, 
fainted, and fell helplessly on the ground. For a few 
moments, alternately, I placed to her nostrils a bottle of 
salts; then I took her to my own home, where I gave her 
a little wine with a cracker, which soon restored her. But 
what really comforted her most was that I myself wept 
with her, and that all my little ones, seeing me weep, 
wept also. Thus this poor dead man was, for his daugh¬ 
ter’s sake, sincerely mourned by hearts that then did not 
even know his name. The accounts which the girl gave 
us of her father’s poverty and sickness and sufferings were 
absolutely sorrowful and heart-rending. Her mother was 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


8l 


also dead, having died less than one year previously ; and 
thus, under the inscrutable ways of Providence, this family 
of poor little children was completely orphaned. In this 
last terrible affliction may Heaven help them! 

“ Nothing affects the poorer classes of the people so 
much as to see their great griefs understood and shared by 
sympathizing persons whom they regard as the inheritors 
of a different nature from their own. At nightfall we 
took the poor girl back to her hut, at the edge of the 
grove, where her little brothers were waiting for her at 
the door, and piteously asked her if their father was not 
coming home. The circumstances of this solemn episode 
afforded to my own little girls the opportunity of acquir¬ 
ing a knowledge of some of the dreadful realities which 
follow the inevitable separations caused by death, and 
which they themselves, not to speak of others, must some 
day endure. We should not disguise to our children the 
contingencies of life. On the contrary, we must let them 
see it just such as God has been pleased to make it for us, 
with all its sweetness and with all its bitterness. To learn 
to suffer is to learn to live.” 

XXVIII. 

" July 5 , 1801. 

“ I have been to the top of the house to-day, to see 
there an aged spinster, whose years have already run above 
eighty, and to whom has been left a small pension and a 
room to live in during her life. She has as an only com¬ 
panion a hen, which is as much attached to her as if it 
were the tamest bird. The name of this ancient maiden 
is Mademoiselle Felicite. Underneath her wrinkles and 
her hair, now as white as the wool in her distaff, one can 
see that when young she must have been very beautiful. 
I have the consent of my husband that we will not remove 

D* 


82 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


her away, notwithstanding the querulous troubles she 
may give us. We should not transplant old trees. A 
room at her age is a whole world. The places which 
we inhabit for a long time become, in reality, a part of 
ourselves. 

“ Mademoiselle Felicite is visited by the wife of the 
church-warden, whose name is Jeanette, who was formerly 
employed in the house, and who is well acquainted with 
all its history, traditions, and idle tales. One always likes 
to know what thoughts and purposes occupied the minds 
of those who previously lived in the same house. Such 
knowledge often causes us to make our own reflections 
amid the routine and prosiness of daily life. Some day, 
for aught I know, future occupants of this house may 
speak even of me as having once lived within its walls; 
and Heaven only knows how soon that day may come! 
My God, where shall I then inhabit ? Oh, let it be in Thy 
great mansion of heavenly rest! 

“After dinner, which is always regularly served at one 
o’clock, I did a little needle-work, and afterward read to 
my servants a chapter of the 4 Meditations on the Gos¬ 
pels.’ In the course of a few hours I shall go to finish 
the day at the church, whose solemnity and darkness 
inspire me with more piety and devotion. It is thus that 
I fill the void left by the absence of my husband. After 
tea, my children and myself will go to take a walk in the 
fresh air, at the extremity of the large grove. This is 
a very pleasant condition of life, being almost entirely 
exempt from either physical or mental sufferings. O my 
God, I do not deserve to be so happy ! Yet I thank Thee, 
ten thousand times over! Permit not that the inconsid¬ 
erateness and short-sightedness of my soul should prevent 
me from tasting the many rich blessings which Thou 
deignest to shower upon me ! 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


83 


“ In my childhood I foolishly imagined that no one 
could live respectably or contentedly anywhere except at 
court, in a palace, like the Royal Palace, or like the Palace 
of Saint Cloud, where I myself then lived with my mother. 
Now, O my God, through Thy great grace, I am always 
happy in whatsoever place Thou art pleased to put me! 

“ When I compare this dilapidated but spacious and 
healthy house, so well exposed, at different hours of the 
day, to both the sun and the shade, in a valley as pastoral 
and picturesque as the one in Switzerland where I spent 
a part of the first year of my married life; when I com¬ 
pare it also with those narrow and smoky houses of the 
cities; with those neighboring cottages out of repair and 
surrounded with weeds and briers; and when I think of 
so many other women more industrious, more resigned, 
and more meritorious than myself, who have neither house 
nor cottage for themselves, nor for their poor little chil¬ 
dren, am I not, O gracious God, already too much favored 
by Thy kindness?’’ 


XXIX. 

“ July 9, 1801. 

“ To-day I am in such a strange state of sadness and 
despondency that I can only attribute it to the absence 
of my husband ; for my condition has not changed in the 
least. But even a change of wind is sometimes enough 
to interfere with our happiness in this miserable world ; a 
world whose inhabitants, of every kind, are at all times 
so impressionable. To-day everything bears to me a 
gloomy aspect. I was so much pleased here only yester¬ 
day ; but now I feel as if I cannot remain longer than the 
beginning of the bad season. 

“I have just been reading the work of Madame de 
Genlis on Education, and am much better pleased with 
it than I thought I should be. I have found in it a great 


84 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


number of excellent rules and suggestions, of which I 
desire to avail myself in behalf of my children. This 
convinces me that we should never allow ourselves to be 
controlled by mere prejudices. I have frequently and 
foolishly spoken in a disparaging manner of both the 
book and its author, relying too implicitly on another’s 
judgment, without myself knowing much of either the 
one or the other. In that I did very wrong; and I now 
sincerely repent of it.” 


XXX. 

“July io, 1801. 

“ Yesterday I was told of a poor woman in the village 
who was so destitute that she did not have even a loaf of 
bread, and who had several small children who could look 
to her alone for food, clothing, and shelter. I went im¬ 
mediately to see her; but there were already three or 
four kindly-natured persons with her. The sight of these 
other sympathizers intimidated me; and, through a true 
or false modesty of not wishing to show ostentation in 
charity, I did not then dare to give her anything what¬ 
ever. I thought I would very soon afterward send her 
something from the house. When I got home, I saw that 
it was too late to send a servant so far at night. In short, 
the poor woman’s other good-intentioned visitors were no 
better than myself; and the consequence was that she and 
her hungry and half-clad children had to pass the whole 
night without food. I have severely and justly reproached 
myself on that score. Very early this morning I myself 
went again to the humble abode of want, taking with me, 
to its wretched occupants, all that I could well spare; 
but, alas, it was not the same thing ! It was not timely. 
It did not come with so good a grace. It failed to give 
the full measure of relief that would have been felt and 
acknowledged last evening. Oh, why is it, indeed, that 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


85 


we are sometimes ashamed to do good, as if, instead, we 
were doing wrong? It is a weakness into which I now 
form the resolution never to permit myself to fall again. 
To this resolution may Heaven help me adhere with 
inflexible fidelity l” 


XXXI. 

July 14, 1801. 

“ This day is passing by very peacefully and pleasantly 
with me ; and I hope it may be passing in the same way 
with all those in whom I am so much interested, wherever 
they may be. I have been thinking a great deal about 
my husband, who is probably with Alphonse to-day at 
Lyons. I suppose he may have taken him temporarily 
out of college, for a little vacation and diversion. Ah, 
how I too should like to be there with them ! I implore 
Heaven to bless them both ! This morning I received 
from my mother a letter which made me feel very happy. 
She is still in Germany. May God surround her with 
His protection ! 

“ This morning I read, in the new work of Madame de 
Genlis, a description of the life of the monks of La 
Trappe, which has impressed me very deeply. What 
struck me as remarkable was that they do not think 
themselves unhappy in this world of deprivations and 
depravity, and that when death approaches them they 
accept it with joy. All of which convinces me that it is 
not so much the material pleasures of the world that 
make us happy, as the clearness of our consciences and 
the proper performance of our duties, however unpleasant 
or even painful those duties may be. 

“ We are always satisfied at the close of the day when 
we have employed it usefully and successfully according 
to our condition and our strength. We then feel as if 
we are living in serene consonance with God’s will. If 

8 


86 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


we were only well convinced of the truth that every one 
who cheerfully resigns himself to whatever position in 
life it has pleased Providence to place him, thereby 
unites himself to the Divine will, we would always feel 
happy, and would permit ourselves to be gently controlled 
by circumstances, and by those who have the right to ex¬ 
ercise authority over us. Since I have myself acted on 
these views, I am infinitely more happy than I ever was 
prior to the time I entertained them; for (let me confess 
with shame) there was a time when I wished that everything 
should be given up to me, and when I was absolutely am¬ 
bitious to subordinate every other person’s will to my own. 
During that period I was incessantly tormented, alike 
with the things of to-day and with the affairs of to-mor¬ 
row. A clearer insight into the economy of the world, 
under Divine guidance, has since frequently constrained 
me to admit that, if my peevish and perverse will had 
been done, it would have resulted only in my own great 
grief and life-long misery. But now, humbly yielding 
myself in all things to the infinite and sovereign wisdom, 
I feel at perfect peace both inwardly and outwardly. 
May God be praised eternally! He alone is wise and 
good ! He alone is worthy of all homage forever and 
forever !” 

XXXII. 

" July 19, 1801. 

“My husband has arrived, and I am happy. We took 
a long walk together to the top of the very highest of the 
mountains which separate our deep vale from the great 
valley of the Saone. These summits, which bend down 
and rise up again by turns, as if they were but vast masses 
of dough-like earth under the heavy hand of God, are 
covered with pine- and beech-trees, and in some places 
with weeds, whose yellow flowers look as if they had been 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


87 


intended for a sort of gilt frame for the landscape. Else¬ 
where are visible purple heaths and gray grass-plots, upon 
which one may see from below the flocks of white sheep, 
so tame and yet so timid, and which, as seen separately, do 
not look larger than if they were so many hens. Sparkling 
here and there is the foam of the little waterfall brooklets, 
whose beds are discernible from the summit to the base of 
the mountain through rows of beech- and chestnut-trees, 
and clumps of willows which are greener and more bushy. 
How the sight and study of all these things ought to in¬ 
spire us with a full consciousness of the greatness and 
goodness of our Creator! How, in truth, the unmarred 
soul is a mirror which reflects vividly and forcibly all 
the beautiful works of God; and especially so when we 
are careful not to permit any interposition between na¬ 
ture and this mirror of the shadows and the clouds and 
the passions of this life ! 

“Arriving at the top of the mountain, we saw before 
us Mont Blanc and the whole chain of the great Alps, 
covered with eternal snow. My husband and his guide 
were on foot, but the children and myself were upon 
donkeys led by little boys. The old vine-dresser, our 
rustic friend of many years, who owns the donkeys and 
who knows the foot-paths perfectly, guided the whole 
party. We were more than three hours in our ascent to 
the highest ridge, although on looking at it from my 
window I had supposed that I might easily attain it in 
half an hour. But distance in the mountains is much like 
time in life : it deceives. Yet time deceives in a contrary 
direction ; we think the mountains low, and they are 
high; we think time long, and it is short; it seems end¬ 
less, even when it has almost passed away forever. 

“We passed the whole day with the children, either 
walking or seated upon the grass, contemplating the won- 


88 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


derful view which one always has from these towering 
heights. There, in the lower distance, could be seen the 
light-hearted native of Macon rambling over his white 
hills, whence came up to us at noon the faint sound of 
bells. There also was the running brook Bresse, with 
its almost endless meadows, like that flat and depressed 
Holland of which my eldest brother, who lived there as 
secretary of the French Embassy, used to send us marvel¬ 
ous views and pictures when we were children. Finally, 
and most conspicuous of all, there too was Mont Blanc, 
\yhich appears by turns—according to the hour and the 
sun—white, rose-colored, and purple, like the end of a 
bar of iron, which quickly and strangely whitens and 
reddens and otherwise colors and discolors itself in the 
glaring fire of the blacksmith. 

“We all dined together, gentlefolk and peasantry, 
upon the grass. After dinner we mounted our donkeys 
again, and returned by another pathway, which runs 
through forests of wild chestnut-trees around the summit 
of the mountain. 

“ The hoofs of the donkeys upon the resounding rocks, 
the laughter and outcries of the children, the brusk 
whistlings of the ousels as they flew away, the loud 
reports of the guns of both my husband and the guide, 
who frequently fired upon the flocks of red partridges, 
and the animated and incessant conversation of the vine¬ 
dresser with the little boys, made a most unusual noise in 
front of our caravan. A timid person might have sup¬ 
posed that it was a band of marauders going over the 
mountain. It was certainly enough to frighten the little 
shepherds who keep their goats and sheep on the borders 
of the stunted forests through which we were passing. 
That, indeed, is exactly what happened ) for we noticed 
very soon in a bare glade above our pathway several 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


89 

droves of shepherdless sheep and goats under the safe¬ 
keeping of two shaggy dogs, which barked at us with 
such trembling and subdued courage as came perceptibly 
from the retreat of their masters. A little further on we 
saw the embers of a small fire between two large rocks in 
the middle of the road. The fire itself was out, but by 
the side of the ashes there were two pairs of little wooden 
shoes like those worn by the more indigent children of 
the country. We supposed that the wearers, who were 
the keepers of the sheep, were not far off \ and I dare 
say our suppositions were quite correct, and that, fright¬ 
ened by the commingled and uncommon noise of the 
many voices and gun-shots in the forest, they suddenly 
ran away and hid themselves in the heath, not having 
taken time to put the shoes on their naked little feet. 
The idea occurred to me to give them an agreeable 
surprise, which enlivened and pleased my little girls 
extremely. Making a brief halt near the cinders of the 
extinguished fire, my husband put a silver piece of the 
value of twelve cents in each of the four little wooden 
shoes, my daughters adding to each a handful of sugar¬ 
plums, which they had taken with them as a part of their 
lunch. Then we went on our way, talking of the prob¬ 
able surprise and joy of the little fugitives when, after 
our departure, and seeing and fearing nothing more, they 
would become sufficiently reassured to return to their post 
and again take up their shoes. They would undoubt¬ 
edly think that certain fabulous creatures called fairies, 
who are superstitiously believed to reside in the grottoes 
and recesses of this part of the mountain (which they call 
The Fairy), had made them this welcome little present on 
passing to or from their abode. The descent through the 
narrow and sonorous ravines re-echoed with the peals of 
laughter of our children, who indulged in much jest of 

8 * 


90 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


the fear of the little shepherds, of their astonishment, of 
their pleasure on finding something valuable, and of what 
they would be likely to tell their mother that night. 

“ The very thing which we had foreseen as likely to 
occur took place. The juvenile shepherds, finding their 
shoes full of sugar-plums and twelve-cent pieces, were 
deceived into believing in the friendly intervention of 
the so-called fairies. But their father and their mother, 
being intelligent people, were not at all deceived ; on the 
contrary, with a delicacy of proceeding which is often 
found among the peasantry of France, they returned sur¬ 
prise for surprise, in order to show us that they were fully 
alive to our waggish kindness. 

“The next morning the servant on unfastening the 
door of the house, which opens into a yard without 
inclosure, found outside upon the threshold four little 
wicker baskets filled with hazel-nuts, cheese-cakes made 
of goat’s milk, and artistic lumps of first-rate fresh butter 
in the exact shape of little wooden shoes. Having laid 
the present on the upper door-step, the children, or those 
representing them, made their escape without discovery, 
thus returning enigma for enigma, mystery for mystery, 
offering for offering. 

“The delicacy of this anonymous little present has 
delighted us very much. It may be that we shall never 
be able to learn with certainty which cottage gave shelter 
to those children, nor the name of any one of the per¬ 
sons from whom come those timid but unmistakable 
thanks, as an acknowledgment which fears to mistake its 
object, but would rather be deceived than fail to tender a 
return.” 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


9 1 


XXXIII. 

“July 22, 1801. 

“ Here we are once again at Milly, our more permanent 
place of residence. I am very sorry indeed to be so far 
away from any church; but I shall endeavor to pray as 
often, and with as much fervor, in my private chamber 
and in the secluded alley of my garden as in that sacred 
edifice.” 

Here follow exclusively domestic details until the 30th 
day of the month last above written. The journal is 
taken up again, in the somewhat regular (and yet irregu¬ 
lar) order of a diary, on the 30th of July, 1801. 

“We left Milly yesterday at ten o’clock to go to 
Changrenon, to spend the day there with Monsieur and 
Madame de Rambuteau, our much-esteemed neighbors. 
Monsieur de Rambuteau, their son, is a very handsome 
young man, who unconsciously displays in his counte¬ 
nance frankness, elevation of mind, and nobleness of 
soul. It is said that he gives fair promise of becoming a 
great and distinguished man. Mademoiselle de Rambu¬ 
teau (who was afterwards celebrated for her beauty at 
the court of Bonaparte under the name of Madame de 
Mesgrigny) is simply bewitching. I sincerely hope that 
my own dear daughters may have such sweet and charm¬ 
ing manners when they shall arrive at her age. She 
played on the piano for us with a most precocious and 
brilliant talent. Her teacher performs perfectly on the 
bass-viol. His name is Breval. He always spends the 
summer in Changrenon and returns to Paris in the winter. 
The parents of Mademoiselle Rambuteau spare nothing 
in the education of their daughter. But she does full 
honor to their worthy aims and sacrifices; only they 
require her to study too assiduously, and consequently 
her physique has become rather pale and weak. 


9 2 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


“ On my return home I found a letter from my sister 
(Madame de Vaux), which gives me good news of my 
Alphonse; it is gratifying in every respect. She also 
informs me that one of the most thrifty tenants on her 
property at Vaux, who had bought from her a farm during 
the Revolution, and had subsequently paid for it in the 
depreciated paper money of the French Republic, has 
himself voluntarily acknowledged that his payment in the 
premises was inadequate; and he has, therefore, of his 
own volition, taxed himself in her interest twenty thou¬ 
sand francs more, and also to a certain specified allowance 
of wine every year, during a period of thirty years ! This 
is a very rare instance of conscientious honesty, and one 
of which we cherish a most pleasing and almost sacred 
recollection.” 


xxxiv. 

" Jiily 31, 1801. 

“ To-day has been a very unlucky day in its antago¬ 
nisms to our little competency. We have had several 
severe storms, and the wind and hail have badly damaged 
our vineyards. And what makes the misfortune the more 
difficult for us to endure is, that our vines were all heavily 
loaded with grapes. Indeed, I have been very sad to¬ 
night, not only on our own account, but also on account 
of our weather-beaten and dejected vine-dressers, whose 
respective portions of wine corresponding with ours will 
be very small this year. Here, though, is another proof 
of how involuntarily and persistently I am attached to 
the things of this world ! It seems to me, in the narrow¬ 
ness of my view, that happiness is absolutely my due; 
and hence it is that the smallest possible grief immediately 
casts me down. My God, forgive me, and cause me soon 
to see and understand the comparative nothingness of 
even the best things of this life, in order that I may the 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


93 


more properly appreciate and strive to obtain the eternal 
blessings which Thou hast in store for those who do Thy 
will!” 

XXXV. 

"August io, 1801. 

“ I am again with child, and I only speak the truth 
when I say that I am already filled with regrets and grief 
about it. For the same reason, whether right or wrong, 
my husband is also affected with sighs and sorrow. How, 
indeed, can we bring up a still larger family on such lim¬ 
ited resources? But, not unmindful of what duty may 
require of me, I am trying to resign myself. May Heaven 
guide and direct me, and restrain me from evil thoughts 
and ways ! No mortal can foresee the future of his own 
existence, nor tell what may happen to others. The 
opinions of the optimists may yet prove to be correct. 
All that is may be for the best. Perhaps this very child, 
now beginning to pulsate in my womb, may yet grow to 
be the crowning joy and satisfaction of my motherhood.” 

This child was a daughter, my sister, whom my parents 
named Sophie, and who, having grown up to be a comely 
and accomplished young lady, was married to the Count 
of Ligonne, a nobleman of Loz£re. In time she herself 
also came to be the mother of a numerous family, every 
member of which was more or less gifted with graces and 
virtues. The father, the mother, the children, all live at 
Mende, in the esteem and affection of the surrounding 
country. 

Here are several dates all consecrated exclusively to 
domestic circumstances, with a great many medical notes 
pertaining to the condition of the sick peasants, whose 
health she had learned to promote by studying attentively 
the works of Doctor Tissot. Now for other little facts, 
which in themselves would be quite insignificant in a city, 


94 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


but which become memorable events in the country; as, 
for instance, the following : 

“ August 26, 1801. 

“A peddler made his appearance among us yesterday. 
Peddlers here are the precursors of autumn. Their pres¬ 
ence soon fills up the gap occasioned by the absence of 
the swallows. It was quite an event for the children. 
Relieved from the importunities of this strolling petty 
merchant, we went to the cottage of a distant peasant- 
neighbor, to dress the scalds of a little boy, whose mother 
had let him fall into a pot of hot water while she was 
making lye. I hope to save the little sufferer.” 

xxxvi. 

" September 2, 1801. 

“ * May the will of God be done V This was the last 
phrase with which I closed my journal at its last date; 
and it is, fitly, I think, the first with which I begin my 
jottings to-day. We were yesterday frightfully and ir¬ 
reparably used by a great hail-storm, which completely 
destroyed what remained of our crop of grapes. But for 
this and the preceding storm we would have had a most 
bountiful year. Now we ourselves will scarcely have 
enough to subsist on, nor half enough for the poor fami¬ 
lies of the husbandmen ! I feel sick. I am overburdened 
with grief and anxiety. This new misfortune will at once 
subject us to many self-denials and deprivations. All our 
projects of spending the winters at Macon for the educa¬ 
tion of our daughters are now overthrown; and, besides, 
we will probably have to sell our horse and our pleasure- 
wagon. But it is God’s will; it is His own doing; and 
this thought ought to be sufficient to console me in every¬ 
thing. The less pleasure I may have in this world, the 
less will I become attached to it; the more, in fact, will 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


95 


I think on the only important and imperishable world, 
the eternal world above. Nothing deceives and hardens 
one so much as prosperity; and that which seems to be 
almost unendurable in nature is, perhaps, a great grace 
of God, having a tendency to lead us eventually to a 
fountain of real and everlasting blessings, by depriving 
us now of those coveted things which are but as dust. I 
am in better mood to-day to entertain these reflections. 
Yesterday the blow was too overpowering. My husband, 
however, had a great deal of courage, much more than 
I could command; although he seemed to suffer, and did 
suffer intensely at the time. He said to me, with manly 
voice and feeling, 1 So that neither you nor our children 
are taken from me, I accept all else; my greatest blessings 
are in your hearts.’ Then he prayed with me in earnest 
accents, which mingled impressively with the rattling of 
the large and fast-falling hail-stones, which violently broke 
the branches of the trees and the window-panes. This 
tempestuous and appalling scene was not complete with¬ 
out the piteous sobs and lamentations of our afflicted 
peasants, who were absolutely in despair, in the yard. 

“This evening I read a most entertaining description 
of a journey to the Pyrenees, by Monsieur Dusaux. I 
was particularly interested in it because it was written in 
1788, the very year in which I was to have gone there 
myself with my mother. We proceeded, however, only 
so far as Limoges; and there, to my great regret, we had 
to stop at the house of one of our relatives, the Count de 
Roy, who has an estate six leagues from Limoges. The 
inclement season having overtaken us quite unexpectedly, 
we passed the whole winter there. It was our intention 
to go to Bareges in the spring; but the Duchess of Orleans 
recalled my mother to Paris, on account of the Revolution 
which was just then breaking out, and which caused her 


9 6 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


to feel profoundly the necessity of good counsel and as¬ 
sistance. I was very sorry, indeed, not to have had the 
opportunity of making a trip to the Pyrenees. I love so 
much, in my imagination, those mountains and the sea, 
neither of which, however, have I ever seen. Those who 
are so fortunate as to be born in sight of such grand and 
beautiful works of God must have truer conceptions of 
Him than we can form, and also a more immediate and 
settled conviction of His immeasurable mightiness and 
His absolute infinity! But no matter now; we shall 
some time, from on high, see and know more about all 
these things, and many other wonders besides. When I 
gaze upward into the vast firmament, during the clear 
and cheerful nights of spring and summer, wearying my¬ 
self in counting as many worlds as there are stars; and 
when I reflect that, behind and still behind those millions 
of worlds, there are still other millions, of which each .and 
every one, as the astronomers tell us, may be larger than 
the largest planet of the solar system, if indeed not larger 
than even the sun itself, I console myself at not having 
seen those little clods of earth and those little pools of 
water, which they call the Alps, the Pyrenees, the Ocean. 

“ To-day is the twenty-fourth anniversary of my admis¬ 
sion into the church. Twenty-four years! How time 
flies ! and how rapidly life itself ebbs away! Why, then, 
should I not now earnestly occupy myself with those 
things which must succeed life on the earth? Existence 
here is only a dream. My God, let this dream be to 
me as painful, or as pleasurable, as Thou wilt have it; 
only vouchsafe to me from it, I beseech Thee, a blissful 
awakening!” 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


97 


XXXVII. 

“September n, 1801. 

“My estimable brother-in-law and his amiable sister, 
Mademoiselle de Lamartine, have spent many hours with 
us to-day. They brought me news of my poor dissipated 
brother, and also of my son, Alphonse, who has already 
received two prizes. His teachers are well pleased with 
him. I confess that I felt a considerable degree of pride 
when they told me so many complimentary things about 
my boy. For this little piece of vanity on my part may 
it please God to pardon me! I myself have contributed 
nothing to any of the good qualities of Alphonse’s soul. 
Those excellent qualities he has derived in part from his 
father on earth, but much more largely from his Father in 
heaven. 

“This evening Madame de Lavernette came to see us, 
on her return from Lyons. She saw there my Alphonse, 
whose teachers enthusiastically assured her that he is 
making wonderful progress in all his studies. His father 
tries to conceal his own glowing satisfaction; but in his 
heart he is just as proud as I am. Yet we are much con¬ 
cerned with the thought as to whether this season of re¬ 
joicing will continue, so long and labyrinthian is the road 
between the boy and the man! This child writes me, 
through Madame de Lavernette, that he is now very im¬ 
patient to come home. I tremble at the apprehension of 
seeing him come pale, thin, and in bad health. By such 
apprehensions, I doubt not, mothers often needlessly em¬ 
bitter their own happiness.” 

XXXVIII. 

“ September i8, 1801. 

“I have just arrived at Macon to meet Alphonse. My 
heart beats warmly and quickly when I think that, in the 
e 9 


9 8 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

course of a few hours more, I am to see again my dear 
child. . . . He has come at last! He arrived very late. 
I had gone to pray in the little oratory of the good ladies 
Focard, a family of uncloistered nuns, who have made a 
sort of convent of their house. I needed this prayer and 
meditation at the foot of the altar to calm my increasing 
agitation. Yet the hoped-for and prayed-for event has 
happened, and I find my Alphonse in excellent health,— 
adolescent, strong, and handsome; and it seems to me 
that he has lost nothing of the simple piety which I have 
tried so earnestly to impart to him, and on which account 
I was and am most deeply concerned. 


xxxix. 

“ September 23, 1801. 

“We had all the members of our family together, and 
also Monsieur de Blondel, a friend of our family, at din¬ 
ner to-day. At the table we spoke a great deal about 
Alphonse, he himself being present. We read an extract 
from one of his disquisitions at school, and also a brief 
essay which his father had requested him to write at 
home. We were all very much pleased with his writings, 
and my pride as his mother was too much flattered.” 

Here follow several dates filled with private details, 
relating exclusively to the duties and interests of the 
household. 


XL. 

“ October 6, 1801. 

“Yesterday I wanted to write something in this jour¬ 
nal, but a feeling of confusion and languidness prevented 
me. I had all day a very vivid recollection of what I 
experienced on that very day twelve years before. With 
what great rapidity, indeed, does time slip away! It was 
the sadly memorable 6th of October, which had proved 
so disastrous to the royal family at Versailles. On that 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


99 


day I was at Chatou, near Versailles, with my mother. 
We were returning from Mesuil, and were intending to 
go directly as far as Paris; but, failing to obtain horses, 
we were obliged to stop at Chatou, and there we slept at 
the house of Madame Duperron, who was my mother’s 
personal friend. This delay proved very fortunate for us. 
Paris was then in a great uproar, and all the carriages and 
other vehicles found going thitherward were stopped and 
detained under arrest or turned back. We were also very 
much alarmed at Chatou, because Monsieur de Lambert, 
son-in-law of Madame Duperron, was at his post as a 
member of the military forces at Versailles. His wife 
and daughters were literally trembling for his life. 

“We passed several days at Chatou, and then left 
there in company with Madame de Montbriand, who 
was like myself a canoness of the Order of Salles; our 
purpose under the circumstances being to make our way 
to Lyons, without again attempting to go to Paris until 
the political affairs of that capital should become more 
tranquil. 

“It was this journey which helped to bring about my 
marriage with the Chevalier de Lamartine, whom I have 
loved, and who has loved me, ever since we first met at a 
certain informal convocation of the Order of Salles in the 
house of the Countess of Lamartine de Villars, his sister 
and my friend. Madame de Montbriand and myself, 
having been under the necessity of stopping twenty-four 
hours at Macon to have our carriage repaired, saw there 
all the family of my husband, who paid us a thousand 
respectful and gratifying attentions. The Chevalier de 
Lamartine was then absent with his regiment. We passed 
the whole day in the mansion of his family at Macon. It 
appears that I was fortunate enough to please them all, 
without a single exception,—his father, his mother, his 


IOO 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


brothers, and his sisters. That happy fact at once re¬ 
newed and increased the prospect of marriage between 
the Chevalier and myself. Whether we should marry or 
not had already been contemplated and discussed for a 
long time; but, from first to last, a thousand obstacles 
had been thrown in the way of arriving at a final decision 
of the important question. I experience now much real 
delight in thinking of the whole of this week in October 
in all of its details, for it was in reality the origin of my 
happiness; and I often give unfeigned thanks to God, 
who conducted me, seemingly by chance and accident, to 
Macon, where He graciously ordained that our thwarted 
love should at last be blessed, and that, notwithstanding 
my subjection to many trials and perplexities, I should 
yet be the creature of so much happiness with my husband 
and my children!” 

XLI. 

“ October n, 1801. 

“This forenoon brought me a letter from my mother. 
She is soon to come back from the watering-places of 
Germany with the Princess of Orleans, whose health is 
now much better. My mother is constantly with this 
noble young lady; she says, however, that she is as yet 
undecided whether she will go to Spain, as she herself 
has an insuperable dread of the Mediterranean, and the 
young princess does not desire to go overland through 
France. 

“With the utmost pleasantness and politeness, my 
good brother-in-law, Monsieur de Lamartine, took me 
yesterday to the hamlet of Champagne, near the castle 
of Peronne, which also belongs to the family. Afterward 
we went to see an elegant house which he has just had 
constructed in Champagne; he having been actuated, 
from the very commencement of the building, by the 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


IOI 


generous intention of transferring the property as a pos¬ 
session to one of my children. Of them he always speaks 
to me as a true father of a family. My children have, in 
all the estates which will come to them after their uncles 
and aunts shall have passed away, a really fine prospect, 
according to the world’s calculation. But, after all, this 
mere material prospect is a very little thing. Rather 
may it please God to make them rich in piety and in 
honor ! Well does Heaven know that that is the only 
true wealth, the only certain riches, I ask for them. 

“Every morning I require Alphonse to read a chapter 
in a good book by a German priest, in order that he may 
learn well the religious sentiments which emanate from 
all nature. I am greatly pleased with his intelligence, 
but it becomes necessary for me to reprove him very 
often because of his lack of patience, especially with his 
sisters. Indeed, I am beginning to fear that his disposi¬ 
tion may be too haughty and too imperious, and that he 
will grow up with these defects conspicuous in his nature, 
unless he soon learn to discipline himself to the use of 
gentler words and ways.” 

XLII. 

“ November 9, 1801. 

“ Here I find myself looking back through the nothing¬ 
ness of a great blank ; the excess of my occupations, and 
the ailments of my children, having prevented me from 
writing for nearly a month. To-day I am again at Lyons, 
where I have brought back Alphonse to his academy. My 
heart bleeds at the mere thought of separating from him. 
This morning I attended the religious services with which 
they open the exercises of the academy. Yet while there 
I could do little else than look about, among all those 
little heads, for his beautiful brown hair. My God, how 
painful it is thus to uproot this tender plant from the heart 

9 * 


102 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


wherein it has been nurtured/ and to throw it so abruptly 
into the mercenary channels of the world ! I felt very 
low-spirited and sick at heart as I came out of the academy. 
Neither the sight of the picturesque mountains along the 
Saone; of the islands of Barbe and of Fourviere, over¬ 
spread as they were by the bright rays of the sun ; nor the 
multifarious noises of the city, heard on descending the 
plateau of the Red Cross at Lyons, could divert my mind. 
In my disconsolateness, I was much like Abraham when 
he turned back to look upon Hagar and her son, aban¬ 
doned to the dangers of the desert. And yet the desert 
itself is but little more dangerous than the immoral crowd 
wherein society compels mothers to abandon their inno¬ 
cent children. I passed the day quietly, almost speech¬ 
lessly, with my sister, Madame de Vaux, who now lives 
at Lyons. We consoled each other, silently mixing our 
tears; for she, too, has had to endure many sorrows and 
great reverses of fortune. 

“ I am spending a whole week at my sister’s, in Lyons, 
in order that I may see, a few more times, my poor 
Alphonse, who cannot readily re-adapt himself to the 
confinement of his school. My being here in this way 
also helps me to accustom myself by degrees to this dis¬ 
tressing separation. 

“ The pious and kind-hearted Abbot of Lamartine, 
who lives on his estate near Dijon, has lent us, for the 
winter, his little house, formerly set apart for the use of 
the Ursulines at Macon. This house adjoins the great 
family mansion, which my brother-in-law, Monsieur de 
Lamartine, and his two sisters now occupy ; and while, 
in one direction, it opens upon an inferior back street, 
very narrow and very sombre, yet it has the advantage of 
communicating, inside, with the large building. I am 
very glad of the opportunity thus afforded me to reside in 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


103 


the city of Macon, for it enables me to employ good 
teachers for my children.” 

The date of the 1st of January, 1802, is signalized in 
the journal by ardent and profuse thanksgivings for the 
many benefits and blessings received during the year past, 
and by strong resolutions to profit by the new year, in 
making more energetic efforts with herself to become 
more perfect in piety. 

XLIII. 

“January 7, 1802. 

“ Bonaparte passed along this road, yesterday, on his 
way to Lyons, to preside there over the deliberations of 
the Cisalpines. Much doubt and speculation exist as to 
the consequences which may result from that meeting. 

“1 have just written to my mother, who is now at 
Leghorn, where she will immediately embark for Spain 
with the Princess of Orleans. May God protect her 
during her passage, and give her a less painful voyage 
than she seems to apprehend ! She writes me to come 
and meet her, and tells me many very complimentary and 
honorable things about the young princess. Monsieur de 
Pierreclos, who has been relieved from the political dis¬ 
abilities which he incurred, has been to see us. He came 
direct from Lyons, where he had gone to get some news 
from Alphonse, who there saw the troops reviewed by 
Bonaparte, in Bellecour Square. His teachers permitted 
him to go there, as a reward for his good conduct, with 
twelve others of their best scholars. I am very much 
pleased with this little distinction ; which I regard as an 
auspicious sign.” 

During the whole of the winter of 1802 the journal is 
diversified only by the impressions, now warm, and now 
more fervent, of a soul who examines the heart with much 


104 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


scrupulousness, and who takes special pains to struggle 
against the weaknesses of our common nature. 

XLIV. 

On the 17th of April my mother returned to the 
country, and while there received letters from Spain. 
She says: 

“ A few days ago I received a letter from my dear 
mother, who, at last, informs me of her safe arrival at 
Barcelona. She experienced a great many unexpected 
adventures, among others a terrific storm, in her passage 
from Leghorn to the harbor of Rosas, which lasted three 
days and two nights. Shortly after they landed at Rosas, 
their ship suddenly and unaccountably disappeared ; and 
they had not yet been able to obtain any news of it when 
my mother wrote. I ought to thank God, most humbly 
and heartily, for the protection He has so graciously 
granted my mother. The meeting between the Duchess 
of Orleans and her daughter was very touching. Eleven 
years had elapsed since they were separated by the Revo¬ 
lution. I do not know when my mother will return to 
France.” 

XLV. 

" September 5, 1802. 

“ I have been absent from this journal a long time, 
and so have made no entries in it. I was delivered of a 
daughter on the 18th of April. My sister, who kindly 
came here to attend me in my confinement, overwhelmed 
me with the gentlest and most constant care and attention. 
I am myself nursing this child with as much sufficiency 
and satisfaction as I nursed all my other children. 

“We have, for the first time, just established family 
prayer in our home; and all our servants are kindly in¬ 
vited and requested to participate with us in this religious 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


io 5 

exercise. It is a very touching and useful custom, if we 
wish and expect our home to be, according to the admoni¬ 
tion of the gospel, a house of brethren. Nothing ordi¬ 
narily exalts the spirit of servants so much as this daily 
communion with their masters through prayer and humility 
before God, who recognizes no distinction of worldly 
wealth or worldly poverty. It is also very good for the 
masters themselves, who are thus reminded of a Christian 
equality with their more lowly companions. Moreover, 
it accustoms the children to think devoutly of their 
heavenly Father, whom they do not see, but to whom 
we thus address ourselves with reverence and confidence 
before them.” 

" September 7, 1802. 

“ My mother is on her way back from Spain to France.” 

XLVI. 

“ October 2, 1802. 

“I am now at Saint Point, and have been here ever 
since yesterday morning, with Alphonse, Cecilia, and 
Eugenia. This gathering of ourselves together has caused 
great joy to my children. Alphonse came on mule-back; 
he was all aglow with ecstasies of delight. We picked the 
grapes from our longest trellis. There were enough grapes 
to make two tuns of wine. My husband has just pur¬ 
chased a very pretty estate, adjoining Milly, from Mon¬ 
sieur Aubel. His sister, Madame de Villars, has lent him 
fifty thousand francs to enable him to acquire this property. 
If our earthly possessions increase thus rapidly (yet we 
seem to have but little for so many children), may God 
grant that we may make a proper use of our success ! I 
brought with me here the 4 Confessions of Saint Augus¬ 
tine/ which is a book I like very much ; and I observed 
with peculiar pleasure, this morning, that Alphonse had 
opened it and was reading it with thoughtful attention.” 

E* 


io 6 my MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

XLVII. 

“ October 28, 1802. 

“ With much gravity and sadness I took my son back 
to Lyons. My mother, who is now on her little estate at 
Rieux, near Montmirail, and who, having but recently 
returned from Spain, finds her affairs in very bad con¬ 
dition, presses me in every letter to visit her for purposes 
of consultation. I shall go, and shall go alone, without 
the children, and without servants; to avoid expenses. 
Would it not be wrong in me to study my own comforts, 
and to foster my vanities, while my good mother, and so 
many other unfortunate persons, who are more worthy 
than I am, have to suffer the cruel embarrassments which 
result from the loss of their fortunes? 

“ I have put my little babe out to nurse with a pretty 
country-girl at Milly, in order to be free to make this 
long journey. I have enough strength now, and am feel¬ 
ing almost as light as I did at fifteen years of age. Yes¬ 
terday I went on foot to the little church at Bussidre, a 
village at considerable distance from Milly. The weather 
was bad and the road was rough; but I felt an unusual 
degree of elasticity, which is one of the best proofs of 
good health. That pleasant piece of pedestrianism re¬ 
minded me of my young days, and especially, among 
other things, of a walk which I once took with my father 
and sister, now of Rochemont, from the castle of Saint 
Cloud to the castle of Meudon, when it really seemed to 
me that I walked in the air, and touched not the ground 
but to rebound upward again. 

“ My poor aunt, who so tenderly and affectionately 
brought me up in the early days of my childhood, is 
dead. The news of her death has grieved me very much. 
I am also distressed about the fate of old Jacqueline, her 
chambermaid, who was likewise a sort of second mother 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


107 


to me, and who will now find herself isolated and per¬ 
haps in want. I should like to bring her home at any 
venture or cost; but the family is opposed to it, my hus¬ 
band fearing, and with good reason, that by so doing he 
might displease and offend his brothers and sisters, on 
whom we depend so much for the future earthly welfare 
of our children. He proposes to me to pay unobtrusively 
and secretly Jacqueline’s board in some house at Lyons, 
where she will be well sheltered from poverty and neglect; 
but I confess that I should like to fulfill more fully and 
openly my duties of gratitude toward this poor woman. 
If I were in her place and she in mine, nothing would 
prevent her from taking me, even, if in the least neces¬ 
sary, into her own bed.*’ 

XL VIII. 

“ December 17, 1802. 

“ Alphonse has just run away from the college with two 
of his school-mates, the young brothers Veydel, whom he 
led away with himself. They were overtaken six leagues 
from Lyons. The close confinement of the college has 
been to him, for some time past, unbearable. I am very 
much grieved about it. His independent disposition 
frightens me. I fear I have spoilt him. His teachers 
met a great deal of resistance in compelling him to write 
to his father a letter of apology and repentance. 

“ I often read the ‘ Confessions of Saint Augustine.’ 
It is a book very proper for me to read at this time. I 
desire to imitate as nearly as possible his pious mother, 
Saint Monica; and, following her devout example, pray 
and pray unceasingly for my children.” 

XLIX. 

“ January 14, 1803. 

“ Yesterday I arrived at Rieux, after a very fatiguing 
journey and a few days’ sojourn at Paris. From Cou- 


io8 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


lommiers to Rieux I was obliged to make the trip in a 
side-saddle upon a farmer’s horse, which a boy led by the 
bridle. The wind was from the north, and was cold and 
freezing. Later in the day the weather changed, clouds 
came, and soon afterward the snow was beating hard 
in my face. I then'suffered as one seldom suffers outside 
of Siberia. 

“ It would be difficult for me to describe adequately 
the great joy I experienced on meeting again my poor 
mother, who, in embracing me, gave proof that she was 
equally full of the same emotion toward myself. That 
moment was one of so much happiness to me that I for¬ 
got all my troubles. Here I am once more in my dear 
little house at Rieux, where I passed happily several 
summer months in my childhood. Ah, if we could only 
find again, in connection with the places of our youth, 
everything that then animated them and imparted to them 
the life of sweet recollections ! My good mother is now 
very much changed, because of her exilements, her travels, 
and her various adversities, including the ordinary cares 
of existence which constantly prey upon her, for herself, 
for her son, and for her daughters. 

“In the evenings my mother tells me a thousand and 
one interesting things, either in relation to our family or 
with regard to the voyages and journeys which she has 
recently taken with the young princess. I always profit 
by her judgment, her determination, and her good advice 
in difficult matters, and greatly admire the firmness and 
uprightness with which she invariably weighs circum¬ 
stances and characters. Yet it is very hard to be in 
such an embarrassed and precarious situation as that in 
which she now finds herself. She has grown very old in 
appearance; but, notwithstanding her misfortunes, she 
is always cheerful and sprightly in conversation. How 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


109 


sincerely I should like to be rich enough, and independ¬ 
ent enough, to help her efficiently in the retrievement 
of her fallen fortunes! But, alas, I can give so little 
out of what is still left for my own household and for 
my children ! I desire to write down every remarkable 
fact which she may state to me. She told me yester¬ 
day that our family came from the Vivarais, and that an 
unmarried lady, a Mademoiselle de Roy, still holds, at 
Montfaucon,. the tenure of Rubec, as the heiress of the 
oldest branch of the house. This peculiar right in the 
Rubec property, after the death of Mademoiselle de Roy, 
will descend to my mother. I do most heartily wish 
for her all that can alleviate and smooth the declining 
days of her life. Even now, at the beginning of her old 
age, she is obliged to deprive herself of the services 
of a waiting-maid. I shall certainly think of her when¬ 
ever I may be inclined to complain of my lot. My 
God, may it please Thee to come to her aid, and to lessen 
and lighten the burden of years and sorrows which now 
weigh upon her, after a long life so agitated and yet so 
blameless! 

“This evening my mother told me a great many things 
about Madame de la Reyniere, the widow of the prin¬ 
cipal farmer of the neighborhood, to whom she was re¬ 
lated, and with whom she always remained intimately and 
happily acquainted. Monsieur d’Orsay is our kinsman 
through this same family ; he married a German princess, 
a relative of the King of Prussia. Monsieur d’Orsay, his 
son, married an Italian princess, though she was of a less 
illustrious house. These regular conversations by the 
fireside recall successively to our minds most of those 
persons with whom my mother was well acquainted, and 
many of whom I have often seen with her in my child¬ 
hood. Alas, how few of them remain after the great 

10 


no 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


political convulsions which have dispersed so many of 
the families of France! 

“ Here I will make mention of a very strange anecdote 
about J. J. Rousseau and the wife of the Field-Marshal of 
Luxembourg, with whom my mother was long and inti¬ 
mately acquainted. This same lady, being also a great 
friend of Rousseau, knew that the unmarried woman with 
whom he then lived was with child. She was afraid that 
Rousseau might be intent on throwing this coming child 
into the foundlings’ hospital, where, as was well known, he 
had already thrown three of his other illegitimate children. 
So she went to see Monsieur Tronchin, of Geneva, a par¬ 
ticular friend of Rousseau, and begged him earnestly to 
have this child when born brought to her, as she wished 
to adopt and rear it. Monsieur Tronchin spoke of it to 
Rousseau, who apparently gave his consent without hesi¬ 
tation. He also had an interview with the mother of the 
child about it, and she was filled with joy at the idea. 
As soon as she was confined, the poor woman caused in¬ 
formation of the fact to be conveyed to Tronchin. He 
came; he saw a beautiful child, a boy full of life and 
promise. He made arrangements with the mother as to 
the hour at which he was to come and take the child the 
next morning; but at midnight, Rousseau, wrapped in a 
sombre-colored cloak, approached the bed of the pros¬ 
trate and helpless mother, and, in spite of her cries, car¬ 
ried away his own child to an infant asylum, and there 
left it forever, without any mark of recognition or dis¬ 
tinction ! And yet this is the man whom so many exalt 
as the possessor of a breast of refined sensibility ! Away 
with the false panegyric! He is simply a madman, or 
a monster whose diseased brain has led his heart astray. 
Alas! genius, when it is not founded on a basis of good 
sense, is but too often the first paroxysm of delirium. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Ill 


Tasso and Rousseau are both evidences of the truth of this 
remark. Let us accept genius for ourselves, if God gives 
it to us, but let us rather wish and pray for good sense 
and good morals for our children ! 

“ The weather now is extremely cold ; the snow is fall¬ 
ing in great flakes. The whole country, as far as the eye 
can see, is covered with the white mantle of winter. I 
am now reading, with great interest, Tacitus and other 
able historians of antiquity, in whose works my mother 
also has always manifested great delight. I inherited 
and acquired this literary taste in the society of philoso¬ 
phers and other learned men, who frequently filled my 
mother’s drawing-room in the Royal Palace. 

“This morning a priest, who ministers to my mother, 
the Abbot Chauveau, a man of great merit and piety, 
held services for us. An infant was baptized, and I was 
much moved by the ceremony. Christenings, even though 
they be of little ones whom I have never seen before, 
always affect me with tender emotion, because they re¬ 
mind me of my own children. 

“I went this afternoon to see a poor woman in child¬ 
bed, quite sick, and deprived of the care and assistance 
which alleviated my own sufferings when I was in that 
excruciatingly painful condition. Reflecting seriously 
upon her destitution and sickness, and remembering all 
the delicacies and health with which I am myself hap¬ 
pily surrounded, I formed the firm resolution not to lay 
up absolutely and entirely for myself anything actually 
necessary for others also, who are in penury, whether it 
be food, or fire-wood, or even money, when I can econ¬ 
omize somewhat, and so be able to relieve one or more 
of the very poor persons who may be within my reach. 
How much more sensitive we always are to the suffer¬ 
ings which we ourselves have experienced, or which we 


112 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


have witnessed with our own eyes! Indirect benevo¬ 
lence is very good, but direct charity, from hand to hand 
and from heart to heart, is much more efficacious. My 
God, be pleased to strengthen me in them; let there be 
no frivolity, nor forgetfulness, nor languor, to prevent me 
from doing my whole duty acceptably in Thy sight! 

“ This morning I again read Tacitus, who, as a his¬ 
torian, pleases me exceedingly. He touches and edifies 
me with his bold and graphic narrations, while other 
historians only instruct me. My father’s library here is 
especially rich in history, and, fortunately, this kind of 
reading imparts to me a disgust for novels and other 
trivial books, attention to which is time lost. 

“To-day I wrote in my mother’s letter a few brief 
sentences to the Princess of Orleans. My mother wished 
and requested me to do so. She has given me the por¬ 
trait of this charming young princess,—the same being 
the portrait which the Duchess of Orleans herself gave 
her as a graceful acknowledgment of the journeys and 
voyages which my mother made to conduct her daughter 
to her at Rosas. 

“ Favored with good roads and a beautiful day, my 
mother and I went yesterday to Montmirail and its en¬ 
virons, to return visits due to old friends of the family. 
There I saw again a certain maiden lady named Made¬ 
moiselle de Champagne. She is a lady of rank, who 
yet lives very poorly in a little cottage; she herself, with 
only one servant, cultivates her own garden, drives the 
cows to the pasture, reaps the harvest, and is quite happy. 

“ At Montmirail everybody spoke in the highest terms 
of Monsieur and Madame Larochefoucauld Doudeauville, 
who have there a beautiful castle. They have just lost 
their only daughter, and there now remains to them an 
only son, who is said to be a handsome and promising 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


XI 3 


young man of about eighteen years of age. Wherever 
we went, mention was made to us of numberless acts of 
kindness which they are in the habit of doing to the 
poorer people of the neighborhood. (Later in life this 
gentleman was honored with the high title and privileges 
of Duke of Larochefoucauld.) My poor brother (who is 
not now so dissipated as he was formerly) arrived to-day. 
He has made peace with my mother, and all the past is sin¬ 
cerely forgiven. He seems to be very reasonable at pres¬ 
ent, and his plans and purposes are not without merit. 
Very soon he will go to England, where my mother will 
recommend him to those estimable and exemplary scions 
of French royalty, the young Princes of Orleans. I hope 
they may in some way be useful to him.” 


L. 

My mother returned to Milly in the spring, and there 
she again took up her journal, expressing her gratitude to 
Heaven for the privilege of once more being permitted to 
rejoin, in life and health, her husband and her children. 
Soon afterward she went to Lyons, with the object of in¬ 
forming herself of the motives which induced her son to 
run away from the college. She sympathized strongly 
with his troubles and his childish dislikes, and at once 
adopted a resolution to use such influence as would, if 
possible, result in his being allowed to finish his studies 
in a more religious and paternal institution. 

“I purchased yesterday,” says she, “several things at 
Lyons to make myself a bed. I bought the principal 
material at two francs a metre. It is not very pretty, but 
it is good, and is by no means displeasing to the eye. 
Henceforth, as I have already said, I am determined not 
to be extravagant. In order that I may be able to do 
some good to those who are in need of everything, I must 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


114 

now begin, in good faith, the practice of self-denial. Alas, 
it seems to me that I never do any good! 

“ My brother writes to me that he is situated very ad¬ 
vantageously in England. But if there should be an out¬ 
break of war, as is apprehended, what will become of 
him? We talk a great deal about the probable future of 
public affairs. 

“Iam now reading a new book, with which I am per¬ 
fectly enraptured. It is ‘The Genius of Christianity,* 
by Monsieur de Chateaubriand. The style at once daz¬ 
zles and enchants me, though, in great matters of this 
kind, it may be that I am not a good judge.” 

Here intervene three months of ordinary details and 
of pious self-examinations of her imperfections and of 
her faults. 

LI. 

" Belley, October 23, 1803. 

“At last I have prevailed on my husband and his 
brothers, after a great deal of argument and persuasion, 
to take Alphonse from his school at Lyons and to put 
him in the college kept by the Jesuits at Belley, on the 
frontier of Savoy. I brought him here myself. Yester¬ 
day, on entering him with those austere ecclesiastics, I 
was too much grieved to write. I passed half the night 
weeping.” 

LII. 

" October 27, 1803. 

“I went this morning to look at my poor child through 
the grating of the yard of the college. I saw him after¬ 
ward in the midst of all the scholars, during the religious 
exercises. He told me that he was much pleased with 
his reception by both his teachers and his school-mates. 
During the day I paid a visit to the Abbot Montuzet, the 
aged prior of the Order of Salles. In the evening I 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


IX 5 


returned to Macon. Passing before the yard of the col¬ 
lege, I saw, from the back of the carriage, the boys run¬ 
ning and playing, and heard their cries of joy. For¬ 
tunately, Alphonse did not come near the railing to see 
my carriage go by; for if he had done so he would have 
shed too many tears, and so would I. It is better not 
to excite constantly the tender sympathies of boys des¬ 
tined to become men. Under my veil I wept alone, in 
the back of my carriage, most of the day.” 

LIII. 

" October 29, 1803. 

“ At Macon I found very sad news from my mother. 
The war with England has compelled my brother to quit 
London, where he had found pleasant and profitable 
employment. He has again come back as a charge on 
my poor mother, who is herself so straitened in cir¬ 
cumstances, at this time, that she is obliged to sell the 
greater part of our little estate at Rieux to pay the ex¬ 
penses and debts contracted by her during her travels in 
Germany and Spain. 

“ To-day I have news from my sister, and I am happy 
that it has been in my power to help her out of her pe¬ 
cuniary embarrassments and to send her one thousand 
crowns, which, through me, the excellent Madame de 
Villars, my sister-in-law, has lent her, without interest, 
for three years. Madame de Villars, economizing and 
refusing herself every luxury, in order that she may be 
true in fact to her vow of poverty, from which, however, 
the Revolution and the Pope relieved her by destroying 
the organization of her sisterhood, lavishes all her for¬ 
tune, which is considerable, on the poorer members of 
her family and on her old and impoverished companions 
in religion. To five or six of these needy persons she 


116 MY MO THER 'S MANUSCRIPT. 

gives annual pensions. The world laughs at her spirit 
and practice of order and economy, but God rewards her 
in her heart, and the poor praise her; nor can they ever 
praise her in excess of her abounding virtues.” 

LIV. 

" March 6, 1804. 

“ After the application to myself, for some time past, 
of a system of careful retrenchment, I have just sent 
ninety dollars to my poor brother. 

“ To-day is the anniversary of my marriage. It is 
now fourteen years since I had the happiness to marry 
a man who seemed to be endowed with the favor of 
Heaven. I knew him to be very amiable and good, but 
I was not aware that he was so nearly perfect. Almost 
his only faults are his scruples of honor and an upright 
ness of soul that takes umbrage at the least indelicacy * 
but these, even at the worst, are the least serious of de¬ 
fects. He lives only for me and for his children; and 
often he has many cares for such a numerous family with 
so small a fortune. Ah, it is for me to try to lighten his 
cares, and for Providence to help us both. I intrust my¬ 
self entirely to God. This faith in my breast—a faith 
which is absolute—is, perhaps, my only virtue; in almost 
everything else I am very imperfect.” 


LV. 

" March 16, 1804. 

“In the cemetery of Bussi£re, which is our parish when 
we are at Milly, a grave-digger found, this morning, the 
dead body of a woman, perfectly well preserved, who had, 
it is believed, been buried there many years. No one could 
be found who knew anything of either her name or her 
history. Judging from appearances, she was a very young 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


117 

woman. She had a wedding-ring on her finger, and a 
rosary in her hand, and seemed only asleep, calmly and 
peacefully waiting for the eternal awakening. I love to 
think that she may have been a saint, to whom God was 
pleased to vouchsafe the extraordinary grace of preserva¬ 
tion from the common fate.” 

LVI. 

" March 20, 1804. 

“ Alas, alas, how greatly I was grieved on Wednesday 
morning ! That morning on going into my sitting-room, 
where I generally do my sewing, I found upon the mantel¬ 
piece a letter from my sister, addressed to my husband. 
In my curiosity and eagerness I supposed I might properly 
open the letter, as my husband has always authorized and 
requested me to do in his absence. What did I see? 
Great God ! the tragic death of my dissolute brother! 
My poor mother had been trying hard to obtain for him 
a situation in business. What, indeed, will become of 
her on hearing the details of this most afflicting misfor¬ 
tune ? O my God, may it please Thee to make it known 
to her Thyself! Have pity on my deceased brother, for¬ 
give the errors of his youth, and shelter his soul with the 
mantle of Thy saving mercies! Since the receipt of this 
awful news I have done little else than go to church, 
where I have wept day and night. Yet my sister informs 
me that our poor brother died resignedly and otherwise 
like a Christian. I most sincerely hope and pray that he 
is now in heaven ! The higher world is, indeed, the only 
explanation of the lower. 

“I have employed all these days in devotional exer¬ 
cises in connection with our church jubilee. My soul 
finds rest only in what elevates it nearer to God. Four 
of my daughters followed me and worshiped with me. 


n8 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 

Among others in the church, there were numbers of young 
girls, who sang canticles, penitents in their ancient cos¬ 
tumes, and a great many boys in file, who were disciplined 
to appear in great meditation. I was much touched and 
edified by what I saw and heard. I pray that God, tenderly 
sympathizing with His creatures, may have mercy on us 
all! 

“ New afflictions now beset me on account of my poor 
mother, who is herself harassed with so many troubles, 
both new and old. It was supposed in Paris that my 
prodigal brother, now dead, had been implicated in a 
conspiracy against Bonaparte. He had neither the bent, 
the will, nor the means for so great a conspiracy. It was 
simply a similarity of name that caused this mistake-,— 
coupled with the circumstance also of his having but 
recently come from England. The officers of the law 
even went so far as to search my sister’s house, wherein 
they made an examination of all his papers. The only 
writings which they found among his effects were friendly 
letters and literary essays.” 


LVII. 

" March 21, 1804. 

“ I spent a considerable part of this morning in reading 
a new novel by Madame de Genlis, on * Mademoiselle 
de la Valliere.’ It is a historical romance, very well 
written, piquant and entertaining, and not without many 
well-rounded paragraphs of needed morality and instruc¬ 
tion. Yet I deem portions of the book rather dangerous 
for young people. It certainly stirred up in me a train 
of wholesome reflections on the comparative nothingness 
of human things, and also on the glaring insufficiency of 
all the greatness of the earth for the happiness here of an 
elevated soul, that constantly feels how immeasurably, in 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


”9 

its very self, it is above and beyond everything that sur¬ 
rounds it. Nothing on earth can ever satisfy it. In vain 
is it unceasingly and restlessly turning and going this way 
and that way over our mundane sphere. Everything calls 
it back to God, in whose realm alone it can at last lie at 
rest and find a happy termination of its numberless agita¬ 
tions and anxieties. Yes, O my God, through Thy grace 
I feel more and more every day the need of belonging 
only to Thee, and the duty of sacrificing everything to 
Thee, so that I may eventually find Thee, and, in finding 
Thee, find salvation for my soul! Anything less than this, 
any less desire or aspiration on my part, would be un¬ 
worthy of me. It is not amiss in me to give myself up to 
these grand thoughts; for my soul is itself an emanation 
from God; and it can find perfect peace and joy only by 
uniting again with the infinite potency of its beginning 
and its end. Let me, O Lord, lift myself up unceasingly 
to Thee, and henceforth may nothing ever again separate 
me from Thy benign presence ! 

“ This morning I sinned against charity, having been 
somewhat rough with a poor girl who came to ask of me 
a little favor. I was very sorry for it afterward, and tried 
to make amends for my fault by being particularly kind 
to her and doing for her everything in my power. Yes¬ 
terday I also experienced a degree of pride and haughti¬ 
ness of spirit. For this old sin, newly committed, may 
it please God to pardon me ! It seems that I really need 
to pray for forgiveness a hundred times a day; so unholy 
and wayward even yet is my poor heart. ” 

LVIII. 

" March 24, 1804. 

“Just now I have noticed that some of my hairs are 
getting gray. What an unmistakable warning of eternity S 


20 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Time hurries on so rapidly! What have I done with my 
youth ? At the very best, my days have been occupied 
only half the time in diligent and judicious labors for 
the present and future welfare of myself and those around 
me.” 

LIX. 

“ Milly, June 17, 1804. 

“Three days ago I was made very peaceful and happy, 
for just then I received from my sister a letter in which 
she gave me good news from my mother. I was led to 
suppose that she had almost entirely recovered her health; 
in fact, she was reported so well that she was already 
speaking of going to reside at Montmirail. Yesterday, 
however, my husband received from my sister another 
letter, which gives me cause for much anxiety. She says 
that during the last two days my mother’s ailments have 
been greatly aggravated. It appears, indeed, that she is 
now very ill. This cruel letter came at a moment when 
Mademoiselle de Monceau and my children were joyfully 
preparing to present me a large and beautiful bouquet. It 
grievously embittered the pleasure which their flowery 
feast would otherwise have given me. I was to have 
dined at Monceau to-day, but, as I could not go myself, 
my husband went, taking with him the children.” 


LX. 

“ May God have mercy on the soul of my good mother ! 
She is dead ! Her great charity, her benevolence, and a 
thousand other virtues which she practiced assiduously 
during her life, will, I believe, secure for her unending 
happiness in heaven. Of late her actual situation was a 
painful one. Yet the very knowledge of her many troubles 
and sorrows, now that they are over, brings me consola¬ 
tion, for I feel assured that through such tribulations she 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 




I 21 

has at last attained her great reward. It was more to 
grief than to age that she finally succumbed. The thought 
that I shall never more be able to see her sweet face in 
this perishable world is heart-rending, and almost terrifies 
me whenever I dwell upon it. 

“ My grandmother lived ninety-two years, and I had 
hoped for the same protracted pilgrimage for my own 
mother. In her verbal will—for she did not execute one 
in writing—she has bettered the condition of my sister. 
My conscience would never be easy if I did not fulfill all 
my obligations to the provisions of this orally expressed 
will with as much scrupulousness as if the will had been 
legally written and recorded. Yet I have heard that there 
are apprehensions of trouble about it. Fortunately, my 
husband thinks and intends just as I do. 

“ This morning I wrote to the Princess of Orleans the 
sad news of my mother’s death, suggesting that she com¬ 
municate it gently to her own mother, the Duchess. My 
husband has just made the formal relinquishment which I 
desired for the sake of my sister, who has now determined 
to purchase Rieux, where we were so happy in our child¬ 
hood. I much fear, however, that this filial obedience 
to our mother’s wishes touching her estate may increase 
the embarrassments of our own little fortune. Interest, 
though, must not be weighed against duty.” 

LXI. 

" September 14, 1804. 

“I am now at Belley, from which place I am to take 
Alphonse for his vacation. I met him in the yard as I 
arrived, and he was quite as much moved as I was. Sud¬ 
denly his surprise and emotion caused him to become so 
pale that I feared he would faint. A moment afterward, 
however, we embraced and re-embraced each other with 


F 


122 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


wild demonstrations of joy. To-morrow he will have to 
play the part of an orator in the public exercises which 
the Jesuits always require of their best pupils at the end 
of the year. The bare thought of the embarrassing trial 
through which my boy will have to pass worries me 
almost as much as if it were I myself who had to deliver 
the oration.” 

Here ensues a long interruption. 

LXII. 

“ February 5, 1805. 

“I have witnessed to-day the taking of the veil by 
several hospital nuns, at the Infirmary of Macon. The 
priest preached a solemn discourse to them, and told them 
that they had irrevocably embraced for life a state of 
penance and self-mortification. A crown of thorns was 
then placed upon each of their heads. Their devotion 
excited my admiration ; but the thought occurred to me at 
the same time, that the mother of a family, if she discharge 
well her duties, may very nearly approximate the degree 
of perfection of the unwedded sister of charity. As a 
general rule, we do not think profoundly enough, when we 
marry, that, under the immemorial provisions of French 
law, we also take a vow of poverty, since by the very act 
of marriage itself we must put unconditionally into the 
hands of our husbands whatever fortune we may possess, 
and thenceforward have no power to dispose of anything, 
however small, except by their consent. In the first place, 
we make to our husbands a vow of obedience, and then 
couple with that a vow of chastity; for we are not per¬ 
mitted even to try to please other men. Furthermore, we 
are of necessity constantly devoting ourselves to the exer¬ 
cise of charity toward our husbands, toward our children, 
and toward our servants. Our obligations require us to 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


123 


nurse our husbands in their sickness, to instruct our chil¬ 
dren as well as we can, and to give to our servants good 
advice and example. I am not, therefore, as one wishing 
to be good and to do good, at all envious of the nuns of 
the hospital. I must simply endeavor to fulfill faithfully 
my own duties, which I consider quite as difficult as the 
duties of any sisterhood, and, in some respects, perhaps, 
even more difficult, since I am not sustained by a multi¬ 
tude of exemplars and assistants all around me. On the 
contrary, the multiplicity of duties devolving on me, as a 
mother, has a constant .tendency to confuse my mind, and 
to hinder me from performing perfectly any particular 
task upon which I may enter. By such thoughts as these 
I feel that my heart has been somewhat chastened, and, 
having renewed my solemn promises of obedience to God, 
I beseech Him to grant me a sufficiency of grace to be 
faithful to them.” 


LXIII. 

“ April 9, 1805. 

“ Here we are in an unusual state of excitement, both 
in the city and in the country. The Emperor Napoleon 
is to arrive here to-day with all his court. My sister is 
still here with me; and we are just now very much incon¬ 
venienced because we have to entertain Bishop Pradt, of 
Poitiers, who is the present chaplain of the Emperor. 
[This Bishop Pradt, of Poitiers, soon afterward became 
Archbishop of Malines, and was first celebrated for his 
obsequious courtiership, and then again for his gross in¬ 
gratitude toward Napoleon, immediately after the down¬ 
fall of the latter.] There are reasons why I would rather 
have Bishop Pradt as a guest than any other member of 
the Emperor’s retinue. Everybody about us is gay and 
eager with expectation of the entrance among us of so 
many distinguished personages.” 


124 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


LXIV. 

“ Lyons, April 26,1805. 

“ I came here with my sister only to see the Pope; and 
I have already seen him pass from the terrace of a garden 
very near the Archbishop’s Palace, where he is stopping. 
Yesterday I attended the high mass celebrated by the 
Pope at the Church of Saint John. I saw the entire 
ceremonies very well, but had great difficulty in getting 
near enough to the altar to obtain a good view of the chief 
celebrant. This pious old man has, indeed, a saint-like 
physiognomy; and many of the Roman prelates who are 
with him are also men whose purity of personal appear¬ 
ance answers well to their holy calling.” 

LXV. 

“ May 12, 1805. 

“ Our fortune, though small, is gradually increasing. 
My husband has just purchased the homestead of Monsieur 
Ozenay. It has a good garden, and the house is well con¬ 
structed and very spacious. After furnishing all the rooms 
handsomely, we will move there this summer. 

“ My husband allows me one hundred and fifteen dollars 
a month, and all the necessary vegetables and provisions 
obtainable from our two farms, for the housekeeping and 
for the payment of Alphonse’s schooling. These allow¬ 
ances are more than sufficient. I am always in lively 
admiration of the providences of God to us, and am ready, 
at any time, to return to Him whenever He may require, 
and in whatever way He may indicate, everything which 
He has so graciously given me. 

“ My apartment is now finished. It is really very 
pretty. I am too well off in this world ! In spite of the 
frequent trials with which God chastens me, I have more 
inward peace and more real happiness than I deserve. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


!25 


My whole and only trust is in the Supreme Dispensator. 
I have just read a mystic and fascinating treatise upon the 
sweet virtue of trust in Providence, which has done me 
great good. Complete resignation to the will of Heaven, 
and perfect reliance on the promises of God, constitute 
to the believer a most inestimable and inexhaustible 
treasure.” 

LXVI. 

" August 20, 1805. 

“This beautiful and commodious room, wherein I in¬ 
stalled myself yesterday afternoon, is probably the witness 
of the last change of apartment that I shall ever make. 
Indeed, I expect to die in it. [Her expectation was at 
last realized ; she did die in that very room.] Alphonse 
arrived here yesterday. I am, I fear, destined to have a 
great deal of trouble with this child, who is already very 
difficult to manage. Two of his sisters will soon be well 
grown into young-ladyhood. When I see myself sur¬ 
rounded by my six beautiful children, I love every one of 
them equally, and feel proud and happy. I beseech the 
good Lord to enlighten me, and to give me the necessary 
intelligence and ability to perform my whole duty toward 
them all!” 

LXVII. 

" November 9, 1805. 

“We have come to spend a week at the castle of 
Monceau, with my eldest brother-in-law, Monsieur de 
Lamartine. My two sisters-in-law, Mademoiselle de 
Lamartine, the angel of the family, and Madame de 
Villars, our terrestrial providence, are both here. There 
are also present some very amiable and worthy gentlemen 
of the neighborhood, among whom are Monsieur Blondel, 
the Abbot Bourdon, and the Commander de Folin, who 
are all old men of fine humor, and full of inexhaustible 
and instructive anecdotes. We lead here a very quiet 

11* 


126 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

life; in fine weather we walk out; in the evenings most 
of our time is spent in playing parlor games and in telling 
stories. But I am not very well pleased with the condi¬ 
tion of my health. I have a kind of burning sensation 
on my face; and I perceive that my complexion is be¬ 
coming rather lustreless and dingy. I will not deny that 
I feel more or less concern on account of these unmis¬ 
takable proofs of the coming on of old age. However, 
if the mere fact of my growing old is a humiliation, it is 
also, perhaps, a great grace, because it detaches me more 
and more from the world, by making me less attractive to 
the eyes of fashion and folly. I must, of course, simply 
and quietly yield to the inevitable. This resignation 
is required of me by Christian duty. Yet the truth 
is, nevertheless, that the consciousness of waning years 
causes me to suffer. Very prone am I to forget that 
thirty-eight winters have already passed over my head; 
and whatever reminds me of the fact of this gradual 
approach of senility is apt to awaken in me emotions of 
sadness rather than sentiments of pleasure. Sometimes 
I am so worldly-minded and selfish (not to say wicked) 
that I ask myself the question, Why could not the common 
law of nature be dispensed with in my case, so that I 
might have the power of preserving the charms of my 
youth even in old age ? May it please Heaven to pardon 
the sin and weakness which I thus disclose in myself by 
giving expression to these vain and foolish thoughts !” 

LXVIII. 

" MlLLY, July 6, 1806. 

“ Here I am once more in this pleasant*, retreat. At 
this place, more than at any other, I always seem to find 
myself at peace with everybody. I love the world, but 
now and then I like to rest from it, sometimes in absolute 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


127 

retirement, and with such light and congenial occupations 
as my garden and my room afford me at Milly.* 

“ My daughters and I ride upon donkeys, to visit the 
various sites and ruins of the neighborhood. We drink 
milk at the cottages, and talk with the countrymen, who 
know me very well, and who seem to love me, because I 
give them advice, and prescribe medicines for their chil¬ 
dren. All these little adventures and experiences give 
me great pleasure. We all like so much to be loved; and 
it is such an easy matter to be loved by these poor, un¬ 
sophisticated country-people; and when hearts are true, 
and where love abounds, how time flies !” 

LXIX. 

" Saint Point, September 7, 1806. 

“ My husband has returned here, from the estates of 
the Abbot of Lamartine, near Dijon, where he always 
spends a part of every summer. So here we are at Saint 
Point, the residence which I still prefer to any other, in 
spite of the dilapidated condition of the mansion. I 
desire to establish here a well-furnished and well-regulated 
moral retreat. Quietude and solitude of heart are some¬ 
times necessary for such thorough self-examination as may 
be conducive to our eternal welfare. * * 

LXX. 

“September 24, 1806. 

11 Many days have been passed by us here in retirement, 
as I had calculated they would be. Our only guest now 
is our pastor. He dines with us every day. Of late the 
weather has been very wet and unpleasant; but I have 
not yet felt gloomy. The day is never long enough for 
all I would like to do ; and my strength is always ex¬ 
hausted in advance of the taste and eagerness which I 
have for my vocations. 


128 


MY MOTHER’S MANUSCRIPT. 


“I go to church every morning at seven o’clock, as I 
had long since resolved to do with my children. We 
breakfast immediately after coming from church; then 
we attend to the minor household duties ; then come the 
sewing, the reading of the Bible, the lesson in grammar, 
and the study of the history of France. All these occu¬ 
pations keep us busy up to the hour of dinner, without 
anybody having found the time too long. After dinner 
I give and take an hour’s recreation, and sometimes a 
little more. Then we resume our work, while one of us 
engages in miscellaneous reading, which I always endeavor 
to make instructive, up to supper-time; after which the 
children learn poetry by heart, the history of the world, 
and geography. Afterward we go again to church, or 
pay our devotions at home; then we take a walk, and 
later in the evening, while I play at chess with my hus¬ 
band, the younger members of the family amuse them¬ 
selves with childish games, and learn verses out of the 
fables of La Fontaine. Whenever and wherever I am 
living quietly with my husband and children, these em¬ 
ployments and pastimes indicate very fairly the routine 
of our daily life. My great object is to set my children 
an example of true piety, and to have them always well 
occupied. Yesterday I received a letter from Alphonse. 
It brought me good news, so far as his health is concerned. 
He seems to be a sensible boy. ’ ’ 

LXXI. 

“ Milly, September 25, 1806. 

“ My husband has just sustained a new loss, this time 
of twenty-one thousand francs, through the failure of his 
wine-merchant. This is a terrible blow, and it has struck 
us all with great force; but my husband endures it with¬ 
out complaining, because the merchant himself is only 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


129 


unfortunate in business. He is, indeed, a very honest 
man. He came in person to say that he had suspended 
payment, and was summoning together all his creditors, 
so that they may divide among themselves everything he 
has. He declares that he will keep nothing for himself. 
How can we fail to appreciate such upright conduct and 
not pity the man who has thus unintentionally injured us? 
But we shall be in very straitened circumstances all this 
year. As means readily available we had only the amount 
mentioned above, and now it is all lost! The will of God 
be done ! I admire very much the tranquillity of my hus¬ 
band in these reverses. Yet, for his children’s sake, and 
for my sake, he suffers a great deal. He is more than a 
man of iron, he is a man of steel, for the vicissitudes of 
this life. 

t6 It had been arranged that Alphonse was to come home 
from college. I went to Macon on the 17th instant, to 
meet him. He arrived alone in the evening. I found 
him much better than I expected. He is now two inches 
taller than his mother; and although he is rather thin and 
pale, yet he is healthy and strong. In most respects he 
is an excellent youth. His teachers, the Jesuits, commend 
him for his present and prospective powers of mind. He 
has come back loaded with first prizes, wreaths, Latin 
discourses, Latin translations, Latin poetry, and French 
speeches; and yet, notwithstanding all his juvenile suc¬ 
cesses and honors, he is becomingly modest. But what 
gives me still more satisfaction and pleasure is the fact 
that he seems now to be really concerned to become 
pious. May God bless him, and preserve within him 
those precious gifts of grace, which are in themselves the 
foundation of the only riches that can ever make him 
supremely happy. After I had embraced Alphonse, I ran 
to the church and there thanked God, with tears stream- 

F* 


130 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


ing down my cheeks, for my son’s safe return, and for so 
many other blessings which He graciously grants me. 

“ It was not without some degree of pride that I pre¬ 
sented Alphonse to all the family at Monceau. Only I 
do not think his manner of speaking is quite so gentle 
and respectful as it should be. Yet I fear to estrange him 
from me whom he loves so much by scolding him about 
it ; and, on the other hand, I am afraid I may spoil him 
by being too lenient and indulgent to his faults. My 
God, what a difficult and responsible matter it is to bring 
a boy up into manhood ! My husband and myself are 
both very much concerned to know what we shall try to 
make of him. He already manifests great fondness for 
the military profession, which is that of his father; but 
this war against Prussia is killing off so many good young 
men ! and then, besides, the licentiousness of the army 
is always so fatal to innocence ! May God enlighten us 
in our son’s behalf!” 

LXXII. 

My gentle mother, whose manuscript I am now re¬ 
vising, returned to the city on the 25th of December, 
1806, and here is what we read in her journal of Janu¬ 
ary 1, 1807 : 

“ This annual point of time tells me very plainly that 
I am advancing with rapid strides toward the eternal 
day. The virtues which I desire most earnestly to culti¬ 
vate this year are urbanity and gentleness of intercourse 
with my fellow-creatures, and also the most perfect humil¬ 
ity. It seems to me that these are the virtues of which 
the world just now has most need. As a general rule, I 
shall, I hope, desire and strive to speak very little of my¬ 
self; to bear with patience the contradictions and humili¬ 
ations to which I may be subjected; to have no studied 
or elaborate elegance in my toilet; never to reprove my 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


* 3 * 

children, nor any one else, with ill humor; and never to 
exhibit any testiness of temper in discussion. It is my 
desire and purpose also never to say anything, if I can 
possibly help it, that would be likely to wound anybody’s 
feelings, whether present or absent. These are the most 
important of my new resolutions; the list is long enough 
for one year ; and the year itself will be well spent by me 
if I only prove myself steady and true to the intentions 
with which I have begun it.” 

LXXIII. 

Nothing of special interest appears again in my moth¬ 
er’s notes until the month of September, but there I read 
and transcribe as follows: 

“My solitude is never a burden to me, but always a 
pleasure. I am now quite alone at Milly, with my chil¬ 
dren and my books. At present my most cherished com¬ 
panions are the works of Madame de S6vigne. This 
afternoon I took a long walk upon the Craz Mountain, 
which is behind the house above our vineyards. I was 
all alone. It is a real pleasure to me at this season of the 
year, in the afternoons and evenings, to wander thus alone, 
sometimes very far. I love the autumn, and nothing ex¬ 
hilarates me more than to walk about the country during 
these delightful days, without any other discourse than 
that which entertains me only through my own impres¬ 
sions. On these occasions my ideas are expansive, like 
the horizon, and upreaching to heaven. Nature excites 
within. my heart a thousand pleasant cogitations, and, 
withal, a kind of melancholy, which charms me. Just 
what causes or constitutes this mysterious influence is 
more than I can explain ; but I have come to regard it as 
something of a secret assimilation of our immortal spirits 
with the infinity of the works of God. When I turn 


1 3 2 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


around and see, from the top of the mountain, the little 
light which shines in my children’s chamber, I thank 
Providence for having given me this peaceful and secluded 
nest, wherein they find both shelter and comfort. 

“ I always begin and finish whatever I do with a brief 
prayer, which is like an inward song of the heart which 
no man hears; but Thou, O Lord, Thou hearest, since 
Thou hearest even the buzzing of the tiny insects in this 
little forest of heaths and weeds which I am now trampling 
under my feet.” 

The journal of the whole of this year, 1807, is filled 
with little else than the rigid and mysterious examina¬ 
tions of a conscience of the most scrupulous integrity; yet 
here and there are found the nervously expressed fears of 
a fond mother as to the common and uncommon dangers 
of an only son, whose morals and whose faith are exposed 
to the blasts of a wicked world. Having returned to the 
city to spend the winter of 1808, she there takes up the 
pen occasionally; but that ordinarily easy-working in¬ 
strument of her thoughts now gives evidence of unusual 
irregularity and heaviness of movement in her hand. 
Nearly all of the year 1808, and much of the year 1809, 
are missing. Here, however, is an inkling of at least 
one of the little episodes which interested and affected 
the family meanwhile. 

There was at Macon a young lady of respectable family, 
of a cultivated mind, and of a stylish beauty, who had in¬ 
spired my mother’s son with one of those inclinations, 
almost infantile, and entirely innocent, which are the pre¬ 
monitory symptoms rather than the real manifestations of 
love. Nevertheless, because of the disparity of age, both 
families were led to apprehend that this slight inclination 
might ultimately entail consequences which would not be 
agreeable or advantageous to either of the two houses. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


133 


It was resolved, therefore, to send the young man abroad, 
on a journey to Italy. They very reasonably supposed 
that the strong breezes of the Alps would cool off and 
blow away the fiery fancy of a too susceptible youth. 

Here we will take up again the manuscript of my mother, 
whose thoughts soon began to concentrate more than ever 
before on plans and efforts for promoting the happiness of 
her son. She knew very well his passion for traveling, 
which, if indulged, would afford him an opportunity of 
seeing many strange and extraordinary things, the mere 
dreams of which, in his little town, had so greatly har¬ 
assed his adolescence. Let us read : 

LXXIV. 

*' Sunday, November 26, 1809. 

“ I am much interested now in reading the * Memoirs 
of Madame Roland/ whose husband was a Minister of 
Government at the beginning of the Revolution. It is 
one of the strange facts of modern history that Madame 
Roland was guillotined. She was a woman of fine mind, 
and was possessed of many admirable traits of character. 
I sometimes think that all possible human virtues might 
have found in her happy and glorious lodgment and func¬ 
tion if, in her youth, she had only not given way to that 
false and mischievous wit which dragged her down and 
bound her to a detestable philosophy, which was then so 
much in vogue, and which caused both her loss and our 
own; for it was, in fact, the sheer folly and madness of 
those opinions which finally led her to the scaffold. Her 
Memoirs are very well written. They have interested me 
exceedingly; only I would advise the skipping of all those 
passages wherein she makes light of religion, for of that 
she speaks very disparagingly. 

“ I would not permit my son to read Madame Roland’s 
12 


134 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Memoirs, although he pointedly requested of me the privi¬ 
lege of perusing them. But I stood my ground firmly, 
and did not yield. I am well aware that he can obtain 
all the books he wants, without my knowledge or consent; 
but, as the least that I can do, I am determined not to 
have to reproach myself with having sanctioned his un¬ 
discerning selections. The thought has also occurred to 
me that, in all probability, most of us give ourselves too 
great liberty in the matter of reading any and every sort 
of book, under the false impression or pretext that there 
is no longer any danger. This is always simply perilous. 
Faith can be shaken at any age; and as for licentious 
thoughts and things, we are always forbidden to put our 
minds voluntarily on them. We are, indeed, very apt to 
feel too much at ease among every class and kind of 
publication. It is only by depriving ourselves of those 
readings which, though agreeable, may yet be dangerous, 
that we can make sure of a proper circumcision of the 
mind. 

“ Monsieur Ligorgne, of Macon, has just died, at the 
age of ninety. He was a very learned man, and had cor¬ 
responded with J. J. Rousseau on religion, philosophy, 
and other abstruse subjects. He was an intimate friend of 
Monsieur de Lamartine, my brother-in-law; and, through 
the impulses of pure friendship, he gave Alphonse a reg¬ 
ular course of lessons in mathematics. He was one of 
those great monuments of the past which we could but 
grieve to see crumbling to pieces. We love Time when it 
is young; we venerate Time when it is old. 

“ Alphonse will spend the winter at Lyons, with a view 
of polishing his manners, and in order that he may acquire 
a better knowledge of the world. He went with Monsieur 
de Balathier, a young gentleman of correct principles. 
We are very glad of this friendship, which will, we trust, 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


i 3 S 

restrain him from the company of rash and reckless young 
men. 

“ I am now here in companionship with only my five 
daughters. It is a very easy matter to lead them in the 
right path. Our life is almost like thaf of a convent. In 
the morning we read together several pages of religious 
literature. Then we study ancient history. These sub¬ 
jects still interest me quite as profoundly as they do my 
children. After dinner we generally do some needle¬ 
work. At dusk we recite together our vesper exercises, 
and, later in the evening, we'sometimes read one of the 
comedies of Moliere. I consider that there is nothing 
wrong in this. Yet, in reading the works of this drama¬ 
tist, I always make it a practice to skip the most danger¬ 
ous words and sentences. Afterward, just before retiring 
for the night, we all say the Lord’s Prayer in common; 
and when that is over, I frequently make a brief exhorta¬ 
tion applicable to the duties which we owe to God, to 
our neighbors, and to ourselves. It is thus that my days 
go by with unwonted rapidity. May God grant that this 
course of life may be one of innocence and advantage to 
our souls! I sometimes think that if I were now free, 
I would soon withdraw into retirement from the world 
and consecrate myself entirely to the service of God. 
But it would seem that we always desire something different 
from what God intends. How infinitely better for us all 
if we would constantly desire and do only those things 
which are well pleasing in the sight of Heaven!” 

LXXV. 

“ My husband is now in Macon, at the General Coun¬ 
cil of the Department, presided over by Monsieur Denon. 
Monsieur Denon is an old man in body, though young in 
mind. His conversational powers are simply wonderful. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


136 

He came to see us, and narrated his travels in Egypt with 
the Emperor. He thrilled us with descriptions of battles 
under close fire. He overwhelms my husband with com¬ 
pliments and distinctions, and has proposed to have him 
elected to the National Legislature. But my husband 
has told me frankly that he might find himself placed 
between his sense of duty and his fortune, and that he 
would greatly prefer to sacrifice all worldly advantages to 
the integrity and peace of his conscience. I admire the 
nobleness of his nature and respect his motives too pro¬ 
foundly to urge him to act differently; although my vanity, 
disguised in dreamy visions of better fortunes for my chil¬ 
dren, would rather induce me to desire the honors and the 
influence which might be expected to flow from the prof¬ 
fered office.” 

LXXVI. 

“ January 7, 1810. 

“I am all the while uneasy about Alphonse, because of 
the dangerous idleness in which he is now passing most of 
his time. It is on his account, just now, that I have special 
need of God’s assistance. His passions are beginning to 
develop themselves; and I fear that his youth and his 
manhood may be very stormy. He is often agitated, gruff, 
and melancholy, and scarcely knows what he desires. Ah, 
if he could only become cognizant of the only good thing 
that would be certain to make him happy ! Some of our 
relatives blame us for allowing him to go to spend the 
winter at Lyons on only his own promise of good be¬ 
havior ; but they do not know all our reasons for having 
done so. We must let people say what they will, and 
meanwhile do what we ourselves think best. Alphonse 
seems much changed by a greater knowledge of men and 
things, and is more and more inclined to study. We 
trust that the numerous resources of a large city will 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


137 


enable him to spend his time pleasantly and profitably. 
It would be more difficult for him to avoid the dangers 
of idleness in a small town like this, where there are so 
many allurements to vice. Besides, we are very glad, in¬ 
deed, that he is nowadays so seldom seen here, because 
he is of a remarkably large stature for one of his age, 
and the mere sight of him might tempt the military 
agents of the Emperor to require us to enlist him in the 
army; and then, too, they might refuse the substitute 
whom we would employ to take his place.” 

LXXVII. 

“ MlLLY, April 11, 1810. 

“ I came here yesterday to stay overnight with Cecilia 
and Eugenia. It was fine weather, and I was just in the 
mood to enjoy one of those bright spring mornings which 
can be found only in the country. So, to-day, almost as 
soon as it was light, I went out into the garden, where I 
must have spent as much as three hours most delightfully. 
The trees are loaded with buds and blossoms, and the 
soft air is balmy with their fragrance. At intervals I 
closed my book to look at the tender leaves just begin¬ 
ning to shoot forth, and to listen to the warbling birds 
and humming insects. Everything in nature seems full 
of new life and vigor and beauty; and what with reading 
and reflecting, what with gazing and dreaming, thanking 
in my heart the great Author of all for His many benefits 
and blessings, and trying to profit as much as possible by 
them, so the hours passed. It makes me feel inexpressibly 
happy,—this enchanting calmness and peacefulness of the 
country, this lovely aspect of nature in the early days of 
spring-time. Alas, I must return to the city, to stay there 
I know not how long! Still, I always try to be content 
with whatever God pleases to send me, and my chief 

12* 


138 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

desire now is to do my whole duty wherever and whenever 
it may call me. 

“ On Sunday I had Monsieur Morel to dine with us. 
He is an artist, architect, draughtsman, and musician, all 
in one, and good in all. It was he who designed the 
most admired of the English gardens around Paris; and 
he is now here to execute drawings for the new pleasure- 
grounds of Monsieur Rambuteau. I happened to meet 
him one day, and learned that he was, many years ago, a 
particular friend of my father and mother. I was quite 
pleased with this information, and accordingly invited 
him to dinner, in order to cultivate his acquaintance 
still further. Although, unfortunately, he is now more 
than eighty years of age, yet, thanks to his intelligent 
and temperate habits of life, he has thus far preserved all 
his faculties unimpaired. He says that he has never 
drunk wine nor spirituous liquors; and this confirms 
me in my own previous resolution never to drink any 
myself. 

‘ 4 Monsieur de Rambuteau is here for several days, and 
I hope and expect to see him again to-morrow, when I 
shall probably hear from him some details about the 
Emperor’s marriage, which he attended. They have, it is 
said, tried to make the ceremony very magnificent; and 
it is admitted that the illuminations were the most brilliant 
of the kind ever seen. In thinking of it I could not help 
reflecting, as I have often done before, on the emptiness 
and triviality of the things which occupy the minds of 
men. Even in this very case—an occasion of so much 
so-called splendor and pomp—one of their greatest pleas¬ 
ures was manifested in placing side by side vast numbers 
of lighted but insignificant little lamps ! The old proverb 
fitly applies again : Vanity of vanities; all is vanity. A 
gleam of light, a great noise, a wreath of smoke, and— 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


*39 

there is glpry ! Is it worth the while to wish this sort of 
thing for my son ?* * 

LXXVIII. 

“ Milly, April 17, 1811. 

“ I have spent a most delightful day at Milly, all alone. 
The weather was superb. ' I walked a great deal, and read 
the first volume of the ‘ Itinerary from Paris to Jerusalem,’ 
an excellent and very interesting work by Monsieur de 
Chateaubriand. 

“Yesterday I went to Changrenon to call on Madame 
Rambuteau. Her husband, sister, and father, Monsieur 
de Narbonne, are all with her at present. I was anxious 
to see Monsieur de Narbonne again, as he used to be 
very intimate with my eldest brother, who was formerly 
Secretary of Legation in Holland, and afterward occupied 
other important and honorable positions. He spoke to 
me in terms of high esteem of my brother. He is an 
amiable man, and is deservedly in great favor with the 
Emperor. Indeed, he is just now frequently spoken of as 
the one most likely to be appointed Minister of Foreign 
Affairs. He was quite attentive to Alphonse, and invited 
him to go and see him at Paris; all of which, however, 
may prove more dangerous than useful to my pretty boy. 
I do not ask the distinctions or the grandeurs orf this 
world for myself or for my family. Yet I would like 
above all things to see my children well established in 
respectable but modest careers, which, after securing 
them a peaceful happiness in this world, would safely 
conduct them to the eternal joys of the next.” 

LXXIX. 

“October n, 1811. 

“Alphonse has written me a letter from Rome, full of 
enthusiasm over the splendid monuments of the Eternal 


140 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


City. How heartily I should like to be withj^im ! But 
I am really too poor to become a traveler for pleasure. 
His uncles and aunts are helping us to pay the expenses of 
his journeyings; and they gave Us yesterday, for him, 
three hundred and twenty-five dollars. With an addi¬ 
tional sum of about one hundred dollars he can, if he will 
practice economy, spend the winter very pleasantly at 
Rome and Naples. But he is rather too young and over¬ 
flowing with imagination to be left entirely to himself in 
those far-off lands. I longed to see him go; and I now 
long to see him return. Night and morning, and twenty 
times a day, I commend him to the kind and merciful care 
of Providence. 

“What a sad and perilous misfortune it is for a parent 
to have a son who has nothing to do ! 

“ In spite of the great reluctance of our family to see 
Alphonse serve under Bonaparte, perhaps we ought to have 
thought somewhat more of our son, and less of our own 
opinions and prejudices. 

“ I hope his friend and school-fellow, Monsieur Aymon 
de Virieu, will soon go and join him. He is a young man 
of riper judgment, who might be very useful to him under 
many circumstances.” 

The last foregoing lines were written just at the time 
when I was leaving Rome to go to Naples, and while I 
was leading that half-vagabond, half-poetic mode of life 
related in the substantially true episode of “Graziella,” as 
th^t incidental narrative appears in the first volume of my 
“ Confidences.” 

LXXX. 

There is a great blank here, and the journal is not re¬ 
sumed until after the return of her son from his travels, 
July 24, 1812: 

“ I have been here now two weeks last Tuesday, the 7th 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


141 


of July. My husband came the day before with Cecilia. 
During the first few^days I was afraid I would find it weari¬ 
some, and did not feel the pleasure I usually experience 
when I go into the country. Since then, however, every¬ 
thing has gone along admirably and delightfully. My 
solitary walks, working and reading with the children, 
attending to two sick people in the neighborhood,—every¬ 
thing, in fact, has interested me as usual; and, all things 
considered, I have been far more happy than I deserved 
to be. God only knows how very little I do deserve His 
grace. This retired and tranquil life has, however, just 
been rudely interrupted by a certain domestic event.” 

LXXXI. 

“ August 10, 1812. 

“ Here I am at Montculot, in the beautiful residence of 
my brother-in-law, the Abbot of Lamartine. In the soli¬ 
tude of a cloister, surrounded by quiet woods and softly- 
murmuring fountains, surely I ought to find rest and peace. 
Yet my serenity of mind is by no means complete. The 
cares of a mother follow me everywhere, always here. 
Ah, how continually I have to reproach myself! How 
extreme’and imperfect I am in everything ! In the world, 
entirely worldly; in retirement, austere to excess; always 
too sensitive to the inflfflnces of surrounding objects, 
whatever they may be, and always yielding to their force 
without opposing my own. In short, I suffer; I deserve to 
suffer! 

1 ‘ Much of my time I pass in reading, and some in 
laying my troubles before God in prayer. I am strongly 
impressed with the brevity of life, and with the necessity 
of preparing for eternity. I often try to imbue myself 
thoroughly with an idea which I remember once to have 
written down, that this life ought itself to be considered 


142 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


a kind of purgatory, and that, however painful it may be 
to bear my troubles, I should not forget that they are sent 
by God, and are much lighter than my many short-comings 
and demerits might justly entail. What I am now most 
anxious about is the settling in life of my six children. 
When I think seriously on the subject, I become a prey 
to all sorts of gloomy and distressing anticipations; and 
yet I know it is unreasonable, if not wicked, to let these 
forebodings torment me thus. God has never failed to 
come to my aid under any and all circumstances; and 
now, with greater confidence than ever, I ought certainly 
to expect His help in this matter, the most important of 
all my aims in this life.” 

LXXXII. 

“December 17, 1812. 

“ To-day I returned from Milly, with the purpose of 
locating permanently in Macon. In passing through 
Changrenon, I dined with Madame de Rambuteau. It is 
always a great pleasure to me to dine with her, or have 
her dine with me; for then we are certain to get to talk¬ 
ing about people in Paris, whom we knew there when we 
were girls together.” 

LXXXIII. 

“January 31, 1813. 

“At last we are going to Announce, to-morrow, the 
marriage of our eldest daughter, Cecilia, to Monsieur 
de Cessia, a nobleman of the Department of Doubs. 
Cecilia is really very beautiful, and almost too young for 
him; but, on the other hand, she is reasonable, and he is 
of good disposition. He was severely wounded at sixteen 
years of age, while serving in the army of Conde, and is 
now a little lame in consequence. He has a father eighty- 
seven years of age, who is now very austere and arbitrary, 
and two unmarried brothers. It is, we think, an excel- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


143 


lent match, which will reasonably insure the happiness 
of our daughter; but still it is a momentous venture, in 
regard to which I cannot help feeling all the solicitude 
of a mother. 

“ Alphonse is now in Paris, where he has been very 
cordially received by Monsieur de Pansey, who is a 
member of the Cabinet Council, and President of the 
Court of Appeals. His cousin also, Madame de Pre, 
who lives with Monsieur de Pansey, her uncle, has been 
very friendly toward him. Monsieur de Pansey is a very 
learned and amiable man, but is now quite old. It aston¬ 
ishes me not a little that, standing as he does on the very 
verge of the grave, and about to leave this foolish world 
and all its vanities, his ears should still be so sensitive 
to the alluring voice of ambition. Truly, ambition is 
a thipg which seems to have an irresistible music of its 
own for the acoustic organs of all human beings, and for 
every period of life. 

“ I have just been in Alphonse’s room to look over his 
books, and to burn such of them as I might deem detri¬ 
mental to his morals. I cannot help feeling that it may 
be wrong on my part to try to prevent in this way the 
natural development of his opinions and judgment; but, 
in any event, it may have the effect of inducing him to 
read and reflect more carefully, when he finds how much, 
on his account, I fear the influence of certain books. I 
found on his table the ( Emile’ of J. J. Rousseau, and 
permitted myself to read several pages in it. I do not 
blame myself for this; for those pages were simply sub¬ 
lime, and have really benefited me very much. I think 
I will even copy and preserve some of the finer passages. 
His style is so grand ! What a great pity it is that his 
writings should be so generally poisoned by seductive 
contradictions and extravagances ! I sometimes incline 


144 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


to the opinion that many of his dissertations were pur¬ 
posely written to mislead the faith of young people. 
I shall burn this book ‘£mile,’ and also ‘The New 
Heloise,’ which is even still more dangerous; in this, 
that it excites the passions while giving, at the same time, 
a wrong direction to the mind. What a misfortune that 
such a great genius as Rousseau’s should border so closely 
upon madness ! or can it be that his genius enabled 
him to see things in a truer light, and that the mad¬ 
ness is ours instead of his ? This is possible. My own 
faith, however, is strong, and, as I trust, above all temp¬ 
tation ; so that I fear nothing for myself, but much for 
my son. 

“ Alphonse has just been the cause of a great sorrow to 
me. His uncles and aunts have received from Lyons and 
Italy several unexpectedly large bills of debts contracted 
during his travels. The family seem to be impressed 
with the conviction that I am spoiling him, and they are 
now unanimous in holding me responsible for his impru¬ 
dent and disorderly conduct. They have emphatically 
reproached me, and I have shed many tears over this 
newly-arisen family trouble. Yet, alas, the accusations 
against me are but too true ! The faults of my child are 
only, in this case, a fuller development of my own faults. 
Why have I not been more justly severe toward him from 
the time when he first began to err ? It is true that he 
would now feel my displeasure more keenly than that of 
any one else ; but perhaps he would not continue to love 
me with the same passion, and, later in life and in graver 
circumstances, the fear of afflicting me might no longer 
be a matter of filial conscience with him. Everything 
will be paid next week ; but that does not prevent the 
necessity of my prepaying now, in listening to the just 
complaints of friends, and with bitter tears, a large part 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


145 

of the penalty of the frivolities and revels of my poor 
child. 

“ He is now at Paris. Monsieur de Larnaud, an ex¬ 
cellent man, of more than ordinary ability, who lives in 
the same house with him, has written in confidence to 
my brother-in-law, with whom he is very intimate, say¬ 
ing that his nephew’s condition of health was causing 
uneasiness; that he was being led by his false friends into 
a passion for gambling ; that he was spending his nights 
around the gaming-tables of Monsieur de Livry, at whose 
house he might easily lose all his money in a single hour; 
that, although he was working part of the daytime with a 
great deal of application and talent, yet gambling, study, 
and loss of sleep were obviously breaking his constitu¬ 
tion, and that his family ought to take him away from 
Paris^ at all hazards, before it should be too late. 

“I therefore left immediately for Paris with my second 
daughter, Eugenia, whom I had fully taken into my con¬ 
fidence. My husband, in leaving home to go on a visit 
to the Abbot of Lamartine, in Burgundy, had left some 
money in his desk. I took it all, and received more 
from my friend, Madame Paradis, from my brother-in- 
law, Monsieur de Lamartine, and also from my sister-in- 
law. I then wrote to my husband, informing him of 
everything, hoping thereby to avoid the scene that would 
be certain to follow if he himself should have to administer 
to our son the first reproaches. On arriving in Paris, I 
thought it best not to go directly to his hotel, for fear that 
his surprise might cause him a too great and too painful 
emotion. Besides, after the letter of this good Monsieur 
de Larnaud, I was trembling lest my boy’s face should 
show too conspicuously the effects of dissipation, and lest 
also I myself should faint away with excitement if I saw 
him without some previous preparation. Accordingly, 

13 


G 


146 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


in the first place, I resolved to see privately Monsieur de 
Larnaud, in order to explain and prepare everything. 
While it was still broad daylight I got out of our carriage 
at a furnished hotel in Richelieu Street, not far from 
Alphonse’s lodgings. O God, how acutely I suffered 
in postponing the pleasure of embracing my son, and in 
awaiting, perhaps until the next day, the visit or the 
response of Monsieur and Madame de Larnaud ! 

“ Exhausted with anxiety, I was seated upon a sofa, 
weeping, and praying, while Eugenia stood at the open 
window, watching the carriages going to the opera or to 
the theatre. Suddenly I heard Eugenia scream, and say, 
‘ Mamma, come quickly, I think I see Alphonse himself!’ 
Running to the window, I recognized him at once. He 
was seated in an elegant buggy, himself driving, and by 
his side was sitting another young man, of handsome and 
pleasing appearance. My son looked very gay and ani¬ 
mated, which did much to reassure me. There was no 
doubt about it, it was really Alphonse, and nobody else. 
My anxieties all departed at the happy sight of him. I 
did not care to interfere with his probable plans for the 
evening, and so resolved at once to wait until next day 
before going to see him. 

“ After passing a very pleasant night, I arose early in 
the morning, impatient to see my boy, and yet dread¬ 
ing the effect which my unexpected arrival might pro¬ 
duce upon him. I was apprehensive that I might find him 
sick and suffering, and reluctant to leave with me; and I 
had every reason to suppose that his money affairs were 
in great disorder. At last I wrote him a letter, telling 
him of my journey, and the motives of it. He came at 
once, and seemed delighted to see us, though hurt at the 
step we had taken. His health did not seem so bad as I 
had feared to find it. He told me that, on my account, he 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


147 


l 


would return to Macon, but that he would not have been 
willing to do so with any one else in the world. All he 
asked of me was to allow him several days, during which 
time he might conveniently arrange his affairs. I gave 
him one week, and was not at all sorry of this oppor¬ 
tunity to let Eugenia see something of Paris.” 

Here follow descriptions of various important features 
of Paris, including museums and walks. She and Eugenia 
both wanted to go to the theatre, but they refrained from 
scruples of conscience. 

“ Early in the afternoon Alphonse drove out with us to 
Saint Cloud. In my younger days, when my mother was 
educating the children of the Duke of Orleans, I spent 
many months at this royal resort. How happy I was in 
those times! I left there when I was only fifteen years 
of age, and had never seen the place since, although I 
have often wished to revisit the scene of so many innocent 
and delightful associations. I walked with Alphonse and 
Eugenia all over the park, pointing out one by one the 
particular trees and spots where I used to play in the days 
of my girlhood. I should have been glad to see once 
more the old familiar apartments of the palace, but the 
Empress Maria Louisa was occupying them at the time, 
and I did not deem it proper to solicit the privilege of 
inspection. 

“ I have given all my money to Alphonse to enable him 
to settle his gambling debts. After winning considerable 
amounts at first, he lost heavily, as is usually the case before 
such accounts are finally balanced. 

“I have allowed myself to be persuaded by Mofisieur 
and Madame de Larnaud to go with them to the opera. 
They assured me that this peculiar entertainment, being 
only a sort of schdol for musical education, was not in¬ 
cluded in the interdictions of the Church. I am now 


143 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


very glad that I went to the opera, for I had formed an 
exaggerated idea of it. I experienced none of that aston¬ 
ishment and intoxication of mind of which I had heard 
so much, but was rather touched with a general feeling 
of pity for mankind, saying to myself, Now at last I am 
looking at that world-renowned combination of all the 
arts and talents and magic powers ! Though, forsooth, is 
this all there is of it? Fudge! It is at best but a sort 
of puppet-show; elegant, it is true, but still with the same 
childish sports; masks, ghosts, devils, alcoholic fires, 
grimaces, and gestures, and turnings, and twistings, and 
contortions of all possible kinds; and curtained machines 
whose wires, intended to be invisible, are only half con¬ 
cealed ! O man ! how weak thou art in all things, even 
in folly ! And when at that very same opera I saw people 
weary of living, the languishing victims of sheer idleness, 
who went there every day to gape and sleep away a few 
hours, oh, then, how deeply I pitied them ! But, as I 
have already said, I am glad to have had an opportunity 
to see and hear the opera, and so to find out what is 
considered one of the greatest pleasures of this world ! 
The entire spectacle, fringed and ornamented with a 
gorgeous paraphernalia of nonsense, lasted about three 
hours. 

“ At last I have snatched Alphonse from the Parisian 
whirlpools of seduction. Returning by way of Rieux, 
adjoining which place is my father’s old homestead, I 
spent there most pleasantly a fortnight with my sister. 
The day before my departure we celebrated the memory 
of our father and mother near the tomb where their 
honored remains lie buried. 

1 ‘My husband and the whole family received me very 
tenderly, but were quite cool in their manner toward 
Alphonse. We have moved back to Milly. Here my 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


149 


prodigal but precious son has resigned himself very well to# 
our solitary mode of life, diligently occupying himself 
the whole day in his room, reading and writing. In the 
evening we gather around the fireside, entertaining our¬ 
selves with our own affairs and with the affairs of our 
neighbors, talking about the late disasters to our armies, 
and grieving over the terrible misfortunes under which 
the madness of Bonaparte has brought our poor France. 
The tide is now setting in against him throughout all 
Europe. What, indeed, will become of us if France be 
invaded by all the countless foreign armies which he has 
gone so far out of his way to raise up against us in Spain, 
in Russia, and in Germany ? Great God, how dearly all 
States and nations purchase the pretended glory of con¬ 
querors ! 

“All our unmarried men are being drafted into the 
military service; taxes are increasing heavily; and our 
legislators are busy in discussing schemes for raising addi¬ 
tional revenues. We have had to sell our horse as the 
readiest means of providing ourselves with money to meet 
certain necessary and emergent expenses.” 

LXXXIV. 

" December 31, 1813. 

“We have taken refuge in Macon. Every day the 
enemy is announced. They are said to have passed 
Geneva already. I have been to Milly, there to hide 
away at all hazards a little wheat, as a last resource in 
case of great need. I wonder what will become of us ! 
What a year of fatal fortunes for France this has been, 
which brings to such a frightful end the bloody dream of 
Bonaparte ! To-morrow commences the New Year; but 
what would it be were it not for the hope of a speedy and 
permanent change for the better?” 

x 3* 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


150 

It is evident from the foregoing remarks that my 
mother was hoping for the fall of Bonaparte and for the 
return of the Bourbons, the kings of her childhood. 

LXXXV. 

“January.^ 1814. 

“The enemy is at Besan^on and near Lyons, and it is 
now apprehended that we may soon have in our neigh¬ 
borhood a field of battle. Still, I am not so much dis¬ 
turbed as, under the circumstances, many might suppose I 
would be. We generally recover our presence of mind 
in the*presence of slowly-approaching danger, and our 
courage is apt to gather in all our reserved and scattered 
forces. I firmly believe and hope in God. 

“People hereabout are in a state of supreme excite¬ 
ment, disputing among themselves and forming different 
parties, according to their varying opinions and conjec¬ 
tures, all of which at this time renders society rather dis¬ 
agreeable for me. With all earnestness, I try to say 
nothing contrary to that spirit of peace and charity which 
ought always to distinguish the conduct of a Christian. 
Sometimes, however, worldlyxonsiderations get the mas¬ 
tery over me, and I blush for being so meanly temperate 
and time-serving. Yet even on these occasions I per¬ 
ceive that I am often judged harshly; but I quietly sub¬ 
mit to these misjudgments, as I do to everything else. I 
am burdened with a multitude of vocations and with 
enormous expenses on account of our large family of 
children, while at the same time I have but little money 
to meet the current needs and demands of the household. 
My trip to Paris, and my payment there of the debts of 
Alphonse, have left us in a sad plight financially; and in 
consequence my husband has been obliged to curtail very 
materially our expenses of living.” 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


151 

The whole journal, up to the 10th of March, 1814, 
contains nothing but a broken narrative of the manoeu¬ 
vring of the French and Austrian armies, occupying and 
surrendering by turns the city of Macon and the sur¬ 
rounding villages. The terrible noise of the battle of 
the 10th of March, between the troops of Augereau and 
those of the Austrian general Bianchi, at the very gates 
of the city, is still reverberating through the long and 
perilous hours in the house of this poor mother, trembling 
for the safety of both her children and herself. We copy: 

“Another great battle on the 10th instant; the French, 
to the number of twelve thousand, trying to rout the 
Austrians. The battle lasted from seven o’clock in the 
morning till four o’clock in the afternoon, with equal 
ardor on both sides, but at last the French were repulsed. 
The losses were about equal on both sides, the number 
of killed and wounded amounting to more than four 
thousand. The cannon have been continually booming, 
and the wounded passing, without stopping, all this long, 
frightful day! 

“During the night and the next day after the battle 
the houses were pillaged in nearly all the villages sur¬ 
rounding Macon. Several mansions in the city, and 
nearly every residence in the suburbs known as Saint 
Antoine and Barre, were also robbed. Many excesses of 
the worst kind have been committed. Oh, the shocking 
and deadly fruits of war ! 

“ The curate and I, with several other ladies, went to the 
headquarters of General Bianchi, to beg of him to put a 
stop to these lawless and brutal misdeeds. He received 
us kindly, but seemed rather to doubt his ability to cause 
at once a discontinuance of the pillage. I think, how¬ 
ever, that since yesterday he has had some of the plun- 


152 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


derers punished. All night a great many horsemen have 
been passing by in silence under our windows.” 

LXXXVI. 

“ March 17, 1814. 

“My daughter Cecilia, having come from the Depart¬ 
ment of Doubs, was confined at my house on the 9th of 
March, amid the awful peals of cannon and the distressful 
outcries of the wounded in the streets. A great many 
troops are now here, and we are overrun with people 
whom we are obliged to feed. We have a General in the 
house, and furnish the table for him and for all his attend¬ 
ants, to the number of twenty-eight, and oftentimes more. 
It is but the shadow of an exaggeration to say that we are 
completely ruined. 

“Alphonse is at Milly, where there are also three hun¬ 
dred soldiers. Four officers, with their servants and 
horses, are quartered upon our premises. New battles are 
expected daily and hourly; but I sincerely hope and pray 
that we may be spared the pain of again having to listen 
to the horrible sounds of two armies in desperate and 
deadly conflict. The French troops are encamped near 
Villefranche, and the Austrians here and hereabout. 

“Alphonse went, on the 10th instant, with a son of 
Monsieur de Pierreclos, to witness the great battle near 
Villefranche. They were almost surrounded, for a few 
minutes, by a body of Austrians, who were stealthily ad¬ 
vancing under shelter of a hill; but they were saved by 
the speed of their horses, several balls having passed 
through their clothes during their flight, and one of their 
steeds having been slightly wounded. They were able to 
reach Pierreclos without further fright or harm ; and from 
there they went to Milly, which the enemy had already 
evacuated. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


153 


“Yesterday there was still another battle near Ville- 
franche, in which the French were routed. They say the 
loss was very great on both sides. Many of the wounded 
have been brought here. Great God, when wilt Thou be 
pleased to turn away Thy wrath ? Oh, forgive us now, 
and cause our bitter war to cease !” 

LXXXVII. 

" Sunday, March 20, 1814. 

“ Two new officers and many soldiers, with body-guard 
and sentinels, found lodgment upon our premises last 
night. At last, thank God, they have all gone. These 
enforced entertainments, even under the laws and pro¬ 
visions of compensation, cost treasures, over and above 
what the more abandoned soldiers bruise and break and 
steal.” 

LXXXVIII. 

"Thursday, April 7, 1814. 

“ Lyons was taken by the Austrians on the 20th ultimo, 
the very day on which I last wrote. General Augereau, 
commanding the French troops, stopped fighting when 
driven to the gates of the city, and the mayor surrendered. 
The French army was given time to retire, passing through 
the gate of Guillotiere. This army is now in the south, 
and is everywhere suffering defeat after defeat. There 
have been no important disturbances in Lyons. It is 
very fortunate for us that the city did not hold out any 
longer; for we would have been irretrievably ruined by 
the detention or continuance of the troops in our neigh¬ 
borhood. Since the surrender we have seen fewer soldiers, 
and have been comparatively restful. 

“Alphonse has had an opportunity of coming to us 
from Milly and Saint Point, where his father left him to 
save our property and administer the affairs of the two 

G* 


154 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


villages of which he had been elected mayor. He has 
succeeded beyond our expectations, and has made himself 
beloved by all the peasantry, whom he has reassured as 
much as possible. There have been no disorders what¬ 
ever.” 

LXXXIX. 

"April io, 1814. 

“ It would seem now, according to current reports, that 
our poor France, in great part actually dead, is about to 
rise up out of the awful condition of oppression, tyranny, 
and agony, in which we have been for the past two years, 
and come to life again. Lyons, Bordeaux, and Paris have 
hoisted the white cockade; and Bonaparte has been sol¬ 
emnly deposed from the throne which he knew not how 
to occupy and defend, and will have to go to the island 
of Elba, which he is to hold as sovereign, with an income 
of six millions a year. A courier has this instant arrived 
from Lyons with a white flag. Here, in the Town Coun¬ 
cil, they are actively and ardently debating whether or 
not to signify their approval of the deposition of Bona¬ 
parte, on the one hand, and the reign of the Bourbons, 
on the other. My husband, my son-in-law, Monsieur de 
Cessia, and Alphonse, all went, and earnestly advocated 
the sanction of these measures. 

“ In my opinion there are no other means of safety for 
France but reconciliation and concert with Europe under 
the restored sovereignty of her old banished royal family. 
Nevertheless, it might be unwise for one here to declare 
himself on the side of the Bourbons. My extreme ardor 
in expressing my own opinions on this subject has already 
caused me some inconvenience, and I have been warmly 
denounced as being very imprudent. Touching some of 
the military events we have no positive information. It 
is said that Paris was taken on the 31st of March; and yet 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


*55 


as late as to-day, the 10th of April, we have received no 
official news of it. It was even feared that those who had 
given honest expression to their views and preferences 
would be insulted ; and, indeed, we ourselves heard many 
abusive and threatening words while walking in the 
evening. 

‘ 4 Another day, and still nothing from Paris. The sus¬ 
pense and anxiety were greatly increasing, when, about 
ten o’clock, a courier arrived bringing the decision of the 
Senate, which solemnly proclaimed the deposition of the 
Emperor. Joy reigned supreme, and was redoubled in 
the evening when intelligence was received of the abdica¬ 
tion of Napoleon arid the restoration of the Bourbons. 
The weather was superb, and the crowd of people prom¬ 
enading was enormous. Men who scarcely knew each 
o{her talked together in the most friendly and familiar 
spirit, while others met and embraced each other as if 
they were really intoxicated with delight. Then there 
was a general illumination, during which the promenading 
and the mirthful conversation were still continued. The 
next day there was an official proclamation of everything 
which had been done, with music and great and glorious 
solemnity. ‘Long live the king !’ was the universal and 
hearty utterance of the populace. That day I had at 
breakfast and dinner many members of the Department 
Council, who had come to Macon in compliance with 
special summons from the Governor of Lyons. 

“I have just come back to Milly with my three little 
girls, and shall be very glad to remain *&t rest here for a 
few days, so that I may be able to restore a greater degree 
of calm and order to my ideas. To-morrow I shall try 
to write down some of the reflections which have forcibly 
impressed me during the occurrence of all these great 
events.” 



156 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

In the following reflections, written at a most memo¬ 
rable epoch in the history of France, and in the quiet 
contemplation of her country home, we see and feel the 
explosion of the long-pent-up feelings which animated 
the breast of a mother against the military domination of 
Bonaparte and in favor of the restoration of a more mod¬ 
erate government, embellished in her imagination by the 
happy recollections of her childhood. This page is the 
lyrical expression of hope after the almost utter forlorn¬ 
ness of despair. A system of government so thoroughly 
detested by women could not possibly have been so popu¬ 
lar as the party historians of to-day represent it. Let us 
peer into the open heart of this mother of a family: 


'* MlLLY, Friday, April 15, 1814. 

“Was there ever, O Lord, a creature more happily 
burdened with Thy benefits and blessings than I am at 
this very moment and in all these present days ? And, at 
the same time, was there ever one more ungrateful? I 
am advancing in age, and am always surrounded and 
guarded by the special protection of Thy divine mercy! 
In the midst of all the evil that has passed around me, I 
have experienced no great private misfortune. All my 
children are around me, alive and well. Even my son 
has been preserved to me, while so many other sons of 
promise have been lost forever. He is growing in health 
and in strength, and is even now in good condition phys¬ 
ically and mentally. All that I ask for him from God— 
and this I ask without ceasing—is to make him a good 
Christian. I constantly check as much as I can the im¬ 
pulses of ambition, which are always but too ready to 
spring up in my heart, and am only concerned—I repeat 
it—for the good of my son’s soul. But, in asking for 
him this great good, and in really desiring only that, I 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


*57 


am yet fearfully lukewarm and apathetic. This is the 
just retribution of God upon me for having been, and 
for being still, too much attached to the world. In de¬ 
livering myself up to the false joys and dissipations of 
life, I have failed to secure the full richness of heavenly 
grace. 

“ Onge everything moved me to closer communion 
with God. I was then supremely happy in solitude, al¬ 
ways finding therein an inexpressible charm in elevating 
my thoughts above all the things of earth. Now it is 
only by the greatest effort that I can in any degree re¬ 
invest myself with this religious enthusiasm. It may, 
however, to some extent, be due to the effects of age 
weighing upon my senses. Yet my health is now excel¬ 
lent, being much better than it used to be. This is still 
another great favor for which I ought to be most thankful 
to Heaven. 

“My daughters also are unusually well and hearty, all 
of them growing up around me (I may truthfully say it) 
in beauty and virtue; for their features are agreeable, 
and their piety is both active and habitual. Sometimes, 
indeed, their religious emotions and observances threaten 
to run into excesses and scruples which I am obliged to 
oppose. 

“ Cecilia and her husband are still with us. Their 
little daughter promises to be pretty. Her mother is 
nursing her with success. Our fortune now seems very 
likely to improve; and we enjoy, more than ever before, 
the respect of the public. This is a brief enumeration 
of a part of the benefits with which God has mercifully 
blessed me. Why, then, am I not always at His feet to 
thank Him ? Why am I not every day more diligently 
occupied in doing my duty to God, by proclaiming His 
glory, and by prudently employing in His service all the 

14 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


153 

precious moments He gives me, whilst so many of my 
countrymen are suffering such cruel pangs ? 

“The fall of Napoleon is, indeed, a conspicuous ex¬ 
ample of the justice of God, and of His long-suffering 
patience. The Almighty is patient because He is eternal. 
The sublimity of this thought has often impressed me. 
It is, I think, from Saint Augustine, or from Bossuet. 
Was it not—and is it not even yet—a terrible tempta¬ 
tion for many restless persons to see that colossus of mere 
earthly ambition and glory exalted upon such a tower¬ 
ing pedestal of iniquity, if I may so speak? For several 
years all Europe seemed subject to his power. He had 
only to wish, only to undertake, and everything succeeded 
even far beyond his own thoughts and expectations. So 
long as he was the instrument of God, nothing stopped 
the course of his conquests, of his devastations, of the 
general overturning wrought by his fatal hand over the 
face of the whole earth. The question might be asked, 
Of what use is virtue, since vice, carried to the greatest 
extreme of imagination, has such a brilliant success? 
Did it not require an almost superhuman effort not to 
feel and utter this blasphemy? But wait, ye men of 
little faith, wait only a moment longer, and ye shall 
witness the waning power of this prodigy, falling down 
still more rapidly than he mounted up, as if struck by a 
mighty thunderbolt from heaven ! Future historians will 
seek a record of the deeds of this bold bad man, who, 
when he dies, will be buried under what is falsely and 
absurdly called his glory, under the ruins of nations, 
and beneath vast masses of the mouldering skeletons of 
victims who were sacrificed on the altar of the insatiable 
ambition of a single tyrant! 

“The kingdom of Saint Louis is about to be revived, 
in harmony with the kingdom of God ! 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


159 


“ Sing now unto the Lord a new song! Yes, let us 
sing of the power and goodness of God over all the 
earth! 

“ Let all the mothers of the land, who will now be 
able to preserve alive the fruits of their wombs, join me 
in singing aloud the song of salvation !” 

It is not at all difficult of comprehension that a son 
whose own blood was derived from the veins of this 
mother, and who, besides, in Italy, and in history, had 
copiously imbibed the spirit of ancient liberty, could 
never be in favor of Napoleon. 


xc. 

" May 9, 1814. 

“ My husband has been elected a member of the pro¬ 
vincial deputation for laying before the throne the adhe¬ 
sion of the General Council of the Department. He left 
Milly on the 28th of April. I shall start immediately for 
Lyons, as I would much like to meet there the Duchess 
of Orleans on her passage through the city, which, ac¬ 
cording to public announcements, will be very soon.” 

This proposed journey did not take place. My father 
returned from Paris after having seen the princes, to 
whom from first to last, though often silently, he had been 
invariably faithful. He was at once offered the positions 
and pensions to which he was entitled, and which were 
given with lavish hand to all the brave and loyal officers 
who, like him, had retired from their regiments rather 
than swear fidelity to a cause in violation of their original 
oaths of allegiance ; but he refused everything, saying 
that he needed no help, being amply able to take care of 
himself and family, and not wishing to burden the State 
with another charge at a time when France was already 
staggering under the heavy load of loans and taxes neces- 


160 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 

sitated by so many formidable revolutions and invasions. 
In her journal, my mother expresses very strongly her 
great admiration for the modest and patriotic disinterested¬ 
ness of her husband. Her good heart seems to have 
become calm again after these agitations. 

xci. 

“ MlLLY, Saturday, June 17,1814. 

“ It is only here at Milly that I am enabled to recover 
well my peace and freedom of mind. Only here, and 
especially during the little journeys which I make almost 
alone, do I find myself in condition to account exactly 
for what is passing and repassing in my soul. I have been 
here now two days, and must leave this evening, much to 
my regret. The country is particularly delightful just 
now ; and, in this season of the year, I am always happy 
at Milly, provided I am not suffering from some physical 
pain, or from some real heartfelt sorrow; and even then, 
there is scarcely any ailment of mind or body that this 
sweet charm of nature does not relieve at last. 

“ Only yesterday I read one of the many sagacious 
remarks of Madame de Stael, who declares that, in order 
to really appreciate and enjoy the beautiful in nature, it is 
necessary to be affected with either love or religion. We 
may strike out the first of these conditions, but the last 
should be carefully preserved. Religion is necessary as a 
condition of heart and soul, fitting us to enjoy perfectly 
the many blessings with which God has graciously sur¬ 
rounded us. Besides, does not religion itself fill the 
whole heart? Moreover, is it not all love? Oh, how 
profoundly I pity those cold and unimpressible hearts 
which are never warmed nor gladdened with the divine 
enthusiasm of true religion ! How many delightful sen¬ 
sations and certitudes there are of which they can form 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 161 

no adequate idea! Yet it has sometimes occurred to me 
(and I do not know that this is any proof of great heresy 
on my part) that there may be in eternity another kind 
of happiness for those irreligious people, more calm and 
oblivious, but less ineffable than the joys vouchsafed to 
the highly ardent and sensitive souls who appear to have 
received a larger and richer endowment of the spirit of 
life and of love. But, on the other hand, how much 
more unworthy will they be if they misuse and throw 
away so many valuable treasures, if they lavish them with 
prodigal hand upon vile creatures who have only death 
and their own nothingness to give back in exchange ! O 
my God, my God, have I not often and bitterly experi¬ 
enced that perfect disappointment which always comes 
from attaching one’s self to aught else than Thee ? Help 
me, then, to renounce all error and all evil, that I may be 
truly Thine, only and entirely and forever Thine ! It is 
time! This inexpressible happiness, I humbly acknowl¬ 
edge it, has never failed me, whenever I have sought it in 
Thee, its only source. 

“ Alphonse has enlisted in the Royal Body-Guard, with 
almost all the youth of the nobility, and such of the 
commons as are favorable to the cause of good order 
throughout the provinces. He has already gone, greatly 
pleased- with the privilege of entering the service; and I, 
too, am happy to know that he is well employed,—though 
in military life,—at least for a little while. He is more 
generally garrisoned at Beauvais, but is often on duty 
at the Tuileries. In two months he will come back to 
spend with us his six-months’ furlough. Yet I do not 
think he will remain a great while in this service, not¬ 
withstanding his present ardor for the life of a soldier. 
He has too much imagination and activity of mind to 
endure military discipline in time of peace. My own 

14* 


162 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


feelings, as well as those of his father and uncles, are 
gratified to see him giving such positive proofs—such 
proofs as almost every man is now ambitious to give—of 
devotion to the Bourbons. He will probably pass several 
years in this way; and meanwhile we will consider 
whether something else may not be better for him. The 
Prince de Poix, commanding his company, was, they say, 
very much pleased with his appearance and deportment. 
He was immediately appointed instructor in the riding- 
school ; and there he is just in his element, for, after his 
books, there is nothing for which he now manifests so 
much fondness as for horses.” 

A long interruption is here apparent. 

xcn. 

" Easter, March 26, 1815. 

“Ah, wnat a difference between this Easter and the 
Easter of last year! Our peace was only a dream.” 

XCIII. 

" July 22, 1815. 

“I was right in saying that our peace was only a 
dream. From the sleep of that dream how cruel has 
been the awakening! Another dream of misfortune has 
lasted three months; but now, as I trust, we are to be 
happy again. God grant that it may last this time! 
This rash and reprehensible return of Bonaparte has cost 
us much national honor, much blood, and much treasure. 
France is ruined. There are still a great many foreign 
troops about us, and we are apprehensive that the treaty 
may not be signed; and yet the conditions for France 
are most humiliating and cruel. Such is the unenviable 
position in which we now find ourselves! 

“ I will not mention again, in this place, all the events 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


163 


of these eight months. They will be -perspicuously writ¬ 
ten everywhere. I will only say that, on receipt of the 
first news of the arrival in France of Bonaparte from 
Elba, Alphonse returned to Paris, where both his duty 
and his heart called him; that, with much trouble and 
hardship, he accompanied the king as far as Bethune; 
that, being there disbanded and thanked by the king, he 
came back amid great personal peril; and that, some 
time afterward, he left here and went to Switzerland. 
But after the battle of Mount Saint Jean (Waterloo) our 
princes returned, and Alphonse then repaired to Paris 
immediately, where he still is, and where he is taking 
steps to obtain a position in the diplomatic service. 
Again we have many hopes. 

“Yet what anxiety and anguish have we not passed 
through ! It is enough to say that Macon was taken by 
storm in the middle of the night, and that I awoke at two 
o’clock in the morning, aroused by the frightful noise 
of the cannon, bomb-shells, and musketry, mingled with 
the most doleful cries in all the streets. For a time I 
feared that we ourselves were doomed to be lost. I got 
up with Cesarine, the only one of my children with me 
at the time; and we knelt down together, and there 
made our humble supplications to God, to whom we 
most earnestly commended our souls. Then everything 
became a little more quiet. The Austrians had become 
the masters of the city, and they did not materially abuse 
nor misuse their victory. Only a few houses were pil¬ 
laged ; and they were entered only because they had 
been imprudently opened. By the great grace of God 
we were spared everything personally objectionable and 
unpleasant. 

“ Now let us see what I have been doing since the 17th 
of September. Cecilia was confined, nearly five weeks 


164 MY mothers manuscript. 

ago, of still another little daughter, which she is now 
nursing, and which has been named Celenia. So far so 
good. Alphonse is still at Paris. In early wifehood we 
long to be mothers; but, alas, when we have children in 
times like these, we suffer in a thousand other fibres be¬ 
sides those with which God has especially provided us for 
the pangs of parturition.” 


xciv. 

Happiness smiles on her again. Under date of Octo¬ 
ber 16, 1816, we read the details of a negotiation of 
marriage between her second daughter, Eugenia, and 
Monsieur Coppens, of Hondschoote, a young and bril¬ 
liant lieutenant-colonel of the Legion in garrison at 
Macon, and son of the ancient Lord of the city of 
Hondschoote, in Flanders. A mutual inclination rapidly 
hastened the end of these negotiations. The marriage 
took place at Macon on the very day of the dedication 
there of a new church. The maternal joy is too great for 
her to conceal it. She thus describes the ceremony : 

“It was decided that they should be married in the 
new church; it was quite near us. So, immediately after 
the consecration of the edifice, which had attracted to¬ 
gether a great concourse of people, we ourselves went 
there also. All my children were near me. Cecilia and 
Alphonse had arrived shortly before, and my little grand¬ 
daughter Alice was there likewise. The weather was 
splendid. All the officers of the Legion were present, 
with their military band, which played several selected 
and suitable pieces. Eugenia was dressed charmingly. 
She wore a dress of embroidered tulle, over a skirt of 
white satin, trimmed with lilies and white roses. She 
carried a bouquet to match, and wore a beautiful veil of 
snow-white lace. She really looked very beautiful. Her 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


i6 5 

husband, who has a noble figure, and whose bearing was 
most manly, was radiant with happiness. Our street, as 
well as the church and all around it, was full of people, 
so that I was considerably annoyed with fear lest some¬ 
body should be hurt. We exercised all possible prudence 
to avoid accidents. 

“I had invited nearly the whole city to spend the 
evening with us, and had imposed on myself much labor 
and care in preparing the house for the reception of so 
many guests. The dining-room, which is very large, was 
arranged for dancing. It was carpeted with green cloth, 
and was brilliantly lighted. The Colonel had sent us 
his regimental band, which we stationed in an adjoining 
room, where it produced a very fine effect. Many, who 
did not dance, played cards in the parlor. In my bed¬ 
chamber, which is a very large room, and from which I 
removed the bed, I placed one long table capable of seat¬ 
ing about thirty persons, and two shorter ones, which 
accommodated together as many more. There was also 
a table for the gentlemen in the large closet adjoining 
my room. On account of having the meats and every¬ 
thing else prepared and cooked in the best possible man¬ 
ner, supper was not served until midnight. I had given 
myself a great deal of concern about this festive enter¬ 
tainment, and had succeeded. Of all the things we had, 
few could have been better. Everybody good-naturedly, 
and with good sense, left early. I myself felt very much 
agitated, and was certainly not the only one to feel so. 
Finally we established the newly-married couple in their 
apartment, and I too retired, after fervently commending 
them to God. The next day I attended divine service, 
and heard a very good discourse, by an eloquent preacher, 
on the building and opening of the new church.” 


166 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


XCV. 

" June 19, 1817. 

“ Alphonse is again traveling. Just now he is in Savoy, 
in the family of a Mr. Maistre, of whom a distinguished 
nephew, Monsieur Louis de Vignet by name, is there his 
most intimate friend. This young man has a superior 
mind, and much talent as yet undeveloped. In this 
respect he is, I think, not unlike Alphonse. Nor is he 
unlike him in his melancholy disposition. His face re¬ 
minds me of Goethe’s Werther, as I used to imagine that 
son of sorrow in my youth. Like the heads of his family, 
he is very religious; and on this account, principally, his 
friendship for my son pleases me greatly. Alphonse has 
uncommon need of examples of positive faith; for his 
religion is too free and too vague, seeming to me to 
be more of a mere sentiment than a matter of sincere 
belief. 

“ From Savoy he will go to Paris. He is all the while 
soliciting a diplomatic appointment, but thus far in vain. 
My own suggestions, and the example of my eldest brother? 
have turned his ideas in this direction; but we ourselves 
cannot open for him the doors of diplomacy; and our 
name, though honorable, is not sufficiently distinguished 
lo attract the attention of the Ministry. He is becoming 
impatient and weary at having to remain so long without 
active employment; and his disappointments fall back on 
me and make me miserable.” 

xcvi. 

“June 20, 1817. 

“I have just received a proposition for the hand, in 
marriage, of my third daughter, Cesarine. The young 
man pleases her; and he pleases me also, in most respects. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


167 

He is descended from a well-known and highly-respect- 
able family in Paris, and his father was distantly related 
to my mother. Cesarine is a dazzling beauty, quite after 
the Italian type, and is said to resemble, feature for feature, 
one of Raphael’s famous faces, known as the Fornarina. 
She is, besides, very much and very justly beloved for her 
wit, her goodness, her simplicity, and her frankness. 
Suzanne, my fourth daughter, promises to be still more 
beautiful; but she is of an entirely different style. She 
is a perfect statue of maidenly innocence and candor. 
Sophie, less fascinating in her features, is nevertheless in 
possession of many great qualities of soul, which are far 
above any mere physical attractions; or, to say the least, 
these qualities of the heart fully compensate for all appar¬ 
ent deficiencies in personal beauty. What priceless treas¬ 
ures I have in my children ! It seems as if Providence 
and nature had most harmoniously co-operated together 
in endowing me with their choicest gifts ! As the mother 
of these children, what a strict account I shall have to 
render to God !” 


XCVII. 

“ June 22, 1818. 

“Iam much opposed and blamed because I encourage 
the suit of the young gentleman who wishes to marry my 
beautiful Cesarine. I am favorably disposed toward him 
because of his excellent character and capacity, and also 
because I believe their marriage would make them both 
happy for life. But (only through absurd and miserable 
considerations of society) my husband’s family object to 
the match. It is true that these two young people have 
not much money; but we could conveniently accommo¬ 
date them in our own home. I am obliged to conceal 
from my husband’s family my real disposition to favor the 
match; but if I did not occasionally act somewhat con- 


i68 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


trary to their ideas and advice, I fear I should never suc¬ 
ceed in bringing about any marriages at all for my poor 
daughters. However, it operates in no small degree 
against my conscience; and it may be that I am doing 
wrong to these young hearts, in permitting them even to 
hope that they may be eventually united. I have con¬ 
sulted one of my most confidential friends about it, and 
he approves of my course. O God, Thou knowest my 
intentions are good ; let them succeed ! 

“ The young gentleman is more in love than ever, and 
comes as often as he can without exciting the frowns of 
the opposing members of the family. When he comes 
too often, I myself receive him rather coldly; but he is 
very discreet. He is also a man of unimpeachable veracity 
and virtue. What at last is to be the result of 'his affec¬ 
tionate attentions to my daughter ? It is a real torment to 
have in one family two opinions based on considerations 
so serious! In marriage, one of the most important acts 
of this life, I do not think the heart is sufficiently con¬ 
sulted by French society. Happily for myself, my parents 
listened to the voice of my own heart; and to that kindly 
condescension and complaisance on their part I owe the 
joys of my wedded life and my fine family of children.” 

XCVIII. 

“ July i8, 1818. 

“The Savoyan friend of my son, Monsieur Vignet, 
who has been staying with us for some time, has just been 
suddenly and unexpectedly called to Paris, to see there 
the Sardinian Embassador, the Marquis Alfieri, with whom 
Alphonse is also well acquainted. It is, I think, a very 
good omen for the diplomatic fortune of this young gen¬ 
tleman, who, like my son, was beginning to be greatly 
discouraged. Ah, how very much I should now like to 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. ^9 

see Alphonse also entering upon some active and useful 
career worthy of him ! 

“ My health has been slightly declining for some time 
past. This, I think, is on account of my troubles of heart 
and mind for my daughters and my son. It is a matter 
which ought to cause me serious reflections. I am now 
almost fifty-two years of age; and, as I have never been 
very strong, I may rationally expect to grow old faster 
than those who are favored with uninterruptedly healthy 
and vigorous constitutions. A knowledge of this fact 
ought to revive and strengthen my piety, and make me 
turn my thoughts entirely toward God. Yet my soul 
itself seems to share the weakness of my body; and I no 
longer feel those lively and devout sentiments which used 
to penetrate my entire existence, elevating and purifying 
my heart, and making me so happy under any and all 
circumstances. I am now cold, dull, worldly-minded, 
groveling in my thoughts. How true it is that we should 
never wait for advanced age as the most proper period of 
life in which to work for the salvation of our souls! O 
my God, help me to conform my ways to Thy will; and 
grant that while the remainder of my days may be marked 
by a larger measure of obedience to Thee, I may also 
learn, even in this the eleventh hour of my career, to per¬ 
form more fully and perfectly my duties to my fellow- 
creatures !” 


XCIX. 

"July 25, 1818. 

“ We have come to Montculot for a few days, and are 
here in the house of my good brother-in-law, the Abbot 
of Lamartine, who is now ailing and weak in mind, but 
not in heart. He almost overwhelms my daughters with 
presents. When he shall have passed away, Alphonse is 
h 15 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


170 

to inherit his estate. It is true that the mortgages and 
other incumbrances amount to about two hundred thou¬ 
sand francs, but the property may, nevertheless, be a great 
help to him in marrying.” 

c. 

Fountain of Fayard, in Montculot Park, August 4, 
1818. It is this truly Arcadian fountain which I cele¬ 
brated, at a later day, in my “Harmonies,” under the 
following title : 

THE SPRING IN THE WOODS. 

Thy murmuring waters are cool and clear 
As they bubble up through the riven rock, 

Silver fountain! How the tender grass lies low 
And green under the shower of thy limpid spray 1 

The sculptured marble of Carrara, 

Whose borders once thy little waves did wash, 

No longer stays thy gentle even flow, 

Which moistens now the carpet of the woods. 

Thy dolphin darkly clad in green, 

And proudly patient in thy solitude, 

No longer pours thy foaming waters out , 

To catch upon their waves the sun’s bright ray. 

These old beech-trees, sylvan giants of glum visage, 

Bend with cold and solemn grandeur over thee. 

Mingling oft their plaintive sighs with the low 
Sad rippling of thy melancholy tide. 

These form a shaded temple for thy grief; 

And the broken marble of thy basin, 

Crowned with the green moss of many a year, 

And the withered leaves of Autumn falling 
With mournful cadence on thy ruffled breast, 

Are an altar and a dirge fit for thee. 


; 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


171 


Little fountain, free and fair! Thy crystal rill 
Ever gurgling forth to quench the thirst, 

Or cool the fevered brow, wearies never; 

Like noble hearts unrecognized in life, 

Yet shedding still their genial smiles around, 

And sympathizing always with the poor. 

Bending over thy basin’s broken border, 

How with pensive gaze I watch thy waters 

Gliding, like a silvery serpent, among 

The pebbles smoothly worn by their soft touch ; 

Or trickling down the side of yon dull rock, 

Like dew upon the monumental stone. 

While listening to thy sad lamenting voice, 

Methinks the old familiar forms I see, 

Whose presence once did mingle with my joys; 

Alas, ’tis but a dream ! they are not here ! 

Nor can those forms ever again in life appear, 

Being now only empty visions of the past! Wherefore 
I’ll sit awhile with thee, my old true friend, 

And join my grief with thine, a consolation 
We may feel, though sad, remembering thus 
Together the scenes of youthful pleasure, 

Mourning meanwhile over happier days gone by ! 

Bright fountain ! whose gentle murmur now I hear, 
How often in my growing years, when full 
Of joy or childish cares, have I not sought 
Thy margin cool, either to laugh or weep ! 

And canst thou tell how often, in the past, 

These woods have heard thy mingled voice and mine ? 
Which one of my pains or my sorrowful thoughts 
Has not floated away on thy rippling wave ? 

O yes! ’tis I, the same whom thou sawest, 

Some years agone, with long locks streaming in the 
Wind, plague thy repose, and play with thy light 
Bubbles, fit for the sport of infant hands, 

I it is, who, oft reclining beneath the 
Shady arch these trees do form above thee, 


172 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


Saw in dreams more numerous than thy drops, 

Visions of rare beauty flit before me. 

Glorious then was my bright horizon, 

Filled with the treacherous rays of hope; 

So in the morning the cloud is gilded, 

Which darkens the path of the noonday sun. 

Later in life, driven by the raging storm 

Within my breast, grieving over some friend deceased, 

How often have I laid my reeling head 

Upon this cold rock whence thou springest forth 1 

Many a time and oft my moistened eyes 
Have tried to look serenely upon thy surface calm ; 
Yet could not; for the bitter tears would trickle 
Through the hands that tried to wipe them, and fall 
Like spattering drops upon a mirror. 

Then thou wert mine only friend, and thee only 
Did my heart trust with its deep secrets; 

For thy gurgling then, dear fountain, seemed 
The sympathizing echo of my sobs. 

And now, led hither by that instinct strong 
Which bids us all seek where before we’ve found, 

I come once more a listener to the noise 
Of thy soothing waters in this shady grove. 

But my fleeting thoughts pursue not very far 
The tortuous course of thy wandering rill; 

Unlike these scattered leaves when borne upon 
Thy waves to where the rapid rivers roar. 

From a world where my thoughts never find rest, 

They quick return to the sound of thy voice, 

To meditate in the depths of the woods, 

Beneath the silent rays of the silvery orb. 

Forgetful of the mighty deep, where thy course 
Will lead thee to be swallowed up at last, 

I love to mount still higher, from vein to vein 
Of earth, even to thy odd and airy birthplace. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


173 


Methinks I see thee, daughter of the clouds, 

Now in vapory billows over the brow 
Of yon high mountain, placidly floating, 

And now pouring down in tempest most terrible; 
Or, now again, rising in gentlest mist 
From the full cups of flowers all smiling. 

The thirsty rock devours thee in the great 
Gorge dug by thy rushing waters, where too 
The grass through every pore drinks in thy 
Crystal drops. Hiding from the curious 
Eye, in earth’s dark caverns, thou filterest 
Till thy virgin pearls are pure and clear as 
The sunlit azure of the vaulted sky. 

Thou appearest! and lo, the desert teems 
With life. A breath rises from thy waters, 

And the old oak spreads again his lofty 
Top, to shade thee with his waving branches. 

The light of dawn floats from leaf to leaf, whilst 
The joyous birds sing along the pathway; 

And man, kneeling beside thy stream, drinks from 
A golden cup, or from the hollow of his hand. 

And whilst the leaves in heaps do gather, 

Faithful still to Him who did command thee, 

“ Flow ever here, the weary one to bless,” 

Thy murmuring voice reveals thy healing presence. 

My ears intent can almost hear thee say, 

“ Here behold the handiwork of thy Creator! 

This prodigy, which angels wondering see, 

Is but the smallest token of His love.” 

Thy sweet solitude and thy murmurings soft 
Seem to fit me for a true home eternal; 

And the sacred sentiment I feel for Nature 
Is my first hymn to her Author. 

Echoing to every sound that comes from the grove 
I hear, within the chambers of my heart, 

* 5 * 


m 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Mysterious voices, whose tones resound 
Like the muffled chant of an angelic choir. 

As thy pure waters, within thy basin swelling, 

Often overflow thy borders, little fountain, 

So my poor heart, swollen with emotion, 

Through my lips its burden now discharges. 

A prayer bubbling up from my heart 
Escapes in rapid accents, and I say, 

" O Thou! whom I on bended knees adore, 
Receive the humble incense of my tears.” 

Thus again, thou seest me beside thee, 

To-day so little like the days of yore ; 

The swan doth change his plumage in Spring, 

And the falling leaves proclaim Winter’s approach. 

Perhaps thou wilt see me again, ere long, 

Bending above thee with whitened locks, 

Or breaking a bough from the old beech-tree, 

To steady the tottering steps of age. 

Then I may sit upon thy moss-covered bank, 

To pass there the remnant of my rickety days. 

So situated, and instructed by thy gentle flow, 

Thy waves may yet teach me how to die. 

Seeing thy waters purling forth in fair volume, 

And watching thy ripples coursing slowly away, 

I will say to myself, “ Behold there the route 
Where my fast-gliding days will soon follow.” 

How many moons remain still to my lot? 

It matters not! I go where thou goest! 

The evening for us both now touches the dawn; 
Flow on, gentle current! forever flow on ! 


I perceive that my mother, with a holier inspiration 
had preceded me in meditations at this very fountain. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


175 


“August 4, 1818. 

“ It is one o’clock, and I have come to take a walk by 
the fountain of Fayard, a charming spot, fresh and shady, 
and close to the castle. I love to reflect and pray here, 
for one exercise, almost always, follows the other. I have 
here thanked God for all the blessings He has granted 
me during my residence in this neighborhood. These 
blessings are both great and numerous, and I have re¬ 
counted them time and again. I am less frivolous than 
I was at the time of my arrival here; and I have found 
again some of my better emotions of other days. I feel 
that more retirement and solitude would revive my piety, 
and consequently increase my happiness. But I am now 
about to leave this place, and to take up again the broken 
threads of business, acquaintanceships, all my regular du¬ 
ties, real and imaginary, and all my doubts and troubles. 
O Lord of Heaven, have mercy on me ! I tremble when 
I think of all the cares and griefs probably yet in store 
for me on account of Alphonse and Cesarine, and of my 
"friend, Madame Paradis, who in her present unfortunate 
situation has great need of me; and then I have great 
concern also on account of numerous other things. O my 
God, impart to me all requisite prudence and courage! 

“ As I walked this morning I thought with much pleas¬ 
ure of the many times I had been there before. I had 
good reasons for remembering six times especially. My 
journal seems to be more useful to me than any one else, 
because I have a very poor memory. Yet I always find a 
peculiar pleasure in thinking over what has happened to 
me in the various positions in which I have been placed. 
Moreover, I find that these reminiscences and reflections 
may be called into the expiatory service of chastening my 
soul. 

“ We are now reading Homer’s ‘ Odyssey,’ and some 


176 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


of the sermons of Massillon; and my children are read¬ 
ing Roman and other ancient history. These younger 
readers have, as usual, behaved very well of late; and, all 
things considered, they are now the most charming mem¬ 
bers of the family. But the question arises, Have I been 
rearing and educating them rightly? Do I not owe my¬ 
self a series of severe reproaches ? This thought comes 
to me when I think of my embarrassments on account of 
Cesarine. O Lord, my God, Thou art my only Hope, 
my only Helper ! Leave me not alone, assist me to over¬ 
come my faults, and have mercy on me and on all the 
members of my household.” 


ci. 

. "August 15, 1818. 

“ Without doubt the many sufferings which I experience 
on account of my children will shorten my life. Some¬ 
times I feel myself sinking under the weight of these 
woes. I suffer each one of their own troubles respectively 
more than they do themselves. The continued idleness 
of Alphonse worries me exceedingly. Was he born only 
for that? I found him again at Milly alone, where he 
had remained, calm but sorrowful,—more than ever liv¬ 
ing in his books, and sometimes writing verses, which he 
never shows. From time to time his friends, Monsieur 
Vignet and Monsieur Virieu, speak to me about him with 
evident enthusiasm; but what good do his talents do 
him, granting that.they are real, so long as they remain 
buried ? Besides, what sort of a thing is this echoless and 
suppressed poetry for a young man now almost devoured 
by the necessity of active life ? 

“ One reason why I rejoiced so heartily at the return 
of the Bourbons was, that I hoped and supposed my family 
would no longer oppose Alphonse’s disposition to do 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


177 


something; and that these princes, whom we have faith¬ 
fully served, would employ my son in a position he is 
capable of filling; but for the last three years they have 
not taken any notice of us whatever. Yet I can well 
conceive how it is. The princes and their ministers are 
overwhelmed with solicitations, and have no occasion to 
search so far away in the provinces to discover the youth¬ 
ful possessors of unknown talents. For a time, at least, 
we must simply resign ourselves to forgetfulness. What 
does this wretched world amount to after all ? Is it worth 
even a regret ? All this I may say to myself, but not to 
my son; for there is a period in life in which illusions 
are as necessary to youth as realities are to advanced age. 
It really seems as if Alphonse were bowed down by some 
secret grief, which he does not speak of, but of which my 
fears occasionally give me a glimpse. It is not natural 
for a young man of his imagination and age to shut him¬ 
self up in such absolute solitude. It must be that he has 
lost, by death or otherwise, something of either present 
or prospective value, which occasions his profound melan¬ 
choly.’’ 

CII. 

" September 12, 1818. 

“ Yesterday Alphonse received a package of letters 
from his most intimate friend, Monsieur Virieu, calling 
him in the utmost haste to Paris. He has sold his horse 
in order to obtain the necessary money, one hundred and 
twelve dollars; and I have given him, besides, all my 
savings during the summer. So now he has gone. Mon¬ 
sieur Virieu, who is in the diplomatic service, and who 
is almost as much interested in Alphonse as in his own 
welfare, told him in his letters that Count Lagarde, the 
French Embassador to Spain, had decided to take him, as 

H* 


i 7 8 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


his secretary, to Madrid. God grant that all his rightful 
plans and purposes may succeed at last! . . , 

“ Strangely and grievously enough, everything has fallen 
through. Alphonse has returned, more discouraged than 
ever, and with increased bitterness against the circum¬ 
stances which force him to remain here in idleness. 
Monsieur Lagarde, who was acquainted with him, and 
who really wanted him, was obliged to start suddenly for 
Madrid without him. Oh, why can I not obtain for him 
that cheerful resignation which I myself draw from con¬ 
stant prayers and from humble submission to the will 
of God ? 

“My project of a marriage for my dear Cesarine is 
now also absolutely impossible. This fact I have been 
obliged to announce, not without tears, to the poor young 
man, who sincerely loved her. The family on my hus¬ 
band’s side are obstinate and unyielding in their refusal, 
and I am in despair. The young man persists in hoping 
against hope. Cesarine, though exceedingly sorrowful, is 
yet quite dutiful and touching in her submission. She 
fears that if she should act contrary to the prejudices of 
the family, however ill founded those prejudices may be, 
the displeasure of those on whom we so largely depend 
might fall on me. This is the considerate and filial view 
which she takes of the matter. What a pity (if not a 
wrong) to crush in this way two pure young hearts, who 
have such a perfectly natural and wholly innocent incli¬ 
nation for each other! Happily, in my daughter’s case, 
this inclination was not a passion, but only a simple dis¬ 
position to love, and a feeling of gratitude for being her¬ 
self so dearly loved. Conventional and cruel as may be 
the sentence, they must not see each other again. 

“Another marriage is now talked of for Cesarine, to a 
gentleman of great merit, who has already asked her hand. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


179 


I have spoken to her about it; and she seems to fall into 
the idea even more readily than I. She is so charmingly 
considerate and obedient! Yet I am unable to determine 
fully in my own mind whether it is through an almost per¬ 
fect spirit of devotion to her family, or more on her own 
account, that she favors this suit. I require a little more 
time to study her in this regard. Alphonse has very man¬ 
fully told her not to do violence to the sentiments which 
she may feel for another, and that he will, if necessary, 
support her in opposition to the whole family, until she 
shall be free to follow her supremest inclinations. She 
replied that she had no other feelings than those of grati¬ 
tude for the kindly sentiments she had inspired, and that 
she would follow, without lasting sorrow, the wishes of 
the family, and marry the worthy gentleman whom they 
were choosing for her. The dear child appears to be as 
reasonable as she is lovely. What a happy husband he 
ought to be for whom Providence destines such a rare 
treasure!'’ 

A few months later, that is to say, in February, 1819, 
the obedience of the beautiful Cesarine had led to her 
happiness,—at least, to a sort of conventional and con¬ 
venient happiness. 

cm. 

“Sunday, February 21, 1819. 

“We arrived at Chambery on Monday the 17th in¬ 
stant, at nine o’clock in the evening. The roads were 
in very bad condition, and the days were hardly long 
enough for the great distances we had to travel. Several 
members of the family were expecting us with impatience, 
and gave us a most hearty welcome. Cesarine appears to 
please the people about here, being well suited to the dis¬ 
positions and ways of the inhabitants of this part of the 
country, who are good and simple and very amiable. 


180 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

They overwhelm us with kind attentions, I might almost 
say with friendship. 

“I have occasion to congratulate myself more and 
more every day on account of this marriage, for which, 
on all sides, I had much trouble to arrange matters satis¬ 
factorily, and to which I myself sometimes felt extreme 
indifference, if not reluctance. This district was but little 
known to us. Monsieur Vignet’s face is not prepossess¬ 
ing, and his property is small. It was I who had to do 
everything, and I sometimes hesitated and trembled, lest 
I should do wrong. I prayed God with confidence to 
enlighten me; and I then saw that, prospectively, every¬ 
thing really good and reasonable was likely to be event¬ 
ually attained in this marriage. I perceived that Cesar- 
ine was far from cherishing any dislike for the personal 
appearance of Monsieur Vignet, and felt sure that she 
would soon learn to love him. I have had the great 
satisfaction since of seeing that I had by no means de¬ 
ceived myself. She loves him very much, and he idol¬ 
izes her. 

“ Monsieur Vignet enjoys a most distinguished and en¬ 
viable reputation. He is full of intelligence and knowl¬ 
edge, and is possessed of almost every manly merit. His 
family is one of the very best in this section of the country, 
and he bids fair to attain, through his own force of quali¬ 
fication and character, and through the support of his 
uncle, Count Maistre, who is now the Chancellor of Sa¬ 
voy, the most eminent position possible in the professional 
career he has embraced. He has a sister, good and ami¬ 
able, who lives with him, and a brother, an old friend of 
Alphonse, and who was the first cause of this marriage. 

“ I am therefore happy, a thousand times happy, be 
cause of having found this honorable issue out of all the 
bewildering mistakes which my weakness led me to com- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 181 

mit, and on account of which I have so bitterly and justly 
reproached myself. For a long time my joy was much 
clouded by this trouble. I could scarcely bring myself up 
to the task of renouncing the poor young man whose 
hopes I had too much flattered ; and I was really very 
much distressed at the sorrow I caused him; but when I 
no longer saw any hope, because of the unyielding oppo¬ 
sition of my husband’s family, I was, for my daughter’s 
sake, obliged to break up the courtship as soon as possible. 
God graciously came to my aid, as He always does in my 
troubles, and I render Him thanks a thousand times for 
all His goodness toward me. The nuptial ceremonies of 
my Cesarine and Monsieur Vignet were brilliant, both at 
Macon and at Chambery.” 


civ. 

" Saint-Amour, in the Department of Doubs, 
“Tuesday, March 9, 1819. 

“ I left Chambery on Thursday, the 4th instant, and 
arrived here before night on Saturday, the 6th, having 
followed my projected route across Mount Chat in coming. 
I had sent forward, it is true, a relay of fresh horses to 
Yenne; and on Thursday we made a very long day’s 
journey. It is not enough to say that the roads were very 
bad; they were frightful and perilous. The mountain is 
very high and very steep. Monsieur Costa, who has his 
residence at the foot of the mountain, hired us two horses 
to assist us in the ascent; but, notwithstanding that assist¬ 
ance, I was often obliged to dismount and walk around 
the more difficult turns, where the carriage itself had to be 
carried, and where I was very much afraid, looking down 
the enormous depths and appalling precipices, and seeing 
at the bottom the lake Bourget, wherein we would have 
been buried had we fallen. The descent is more easy, 

16 


182 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


but the danger commences again at Yenne, the road being 
a sort of narrow cornice without border, having on one 
side huge and threatening rocks, and on the other, at a 
depth of at least three or four hundred feet, the swift and 
narrow current of the Rhone. 

“On the other side of the Rhone there are still enor¬ 
mous rocks, and the State Prison known as Pierre Chatre. 
There are some very picturesque views; among others a 
deep and narrow defile between two prodigious peaks, 
where one can scarcely get a glimpse of the sky. The 
pass is rather long, and it seemed to me all the while that 
one or the other of the immense masses on either hand, 
above, was about to fall and bury me beneath its ruins. 
It is there that we may feel in all its force the littleness 
of man, his utter dependence on God, and his need to be 
always prepared to enter His presence. 

“ There it is that we are astonished at our own reckless¬ 
ness and temerity, and the great dangers to which we 
strangely accustom ourselves. We are apt to be more 
struck by these thoughts here than elsewhere, because the 
wonderfulness and grandeur of the scenery are more out 
of our ordinary experience. But, in reality, is there not 
danger to us everywhere and in everything ? Are we not 
always completely under that Divine Hand which, at any 
moment, can crush us to the earth like miserable insects ? 
And still we dare to rebel in our thoughts ! to think our¬ 
selves independent ! and to be proud ! What madness ! 
It is thus that Nature, by her mighty frowning aspect, 
impresses us somewhat with a realizing sense of our own 
nothingness! 

“ At last, after so many excitements, I have come to 
rest myself, with my daughter Cecilia (de Cessia), at Saint- 
Amour. She is very happy here, is almost adored for the 
goodness of her character, and is surrounded by her charm- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


183 

ing family of children, of which each and every year seems 
to be impatient to increase the number. Here, at last, I 
have had the opportunity of giving myself up quietly to 
my reflections. It was a poignant grief to me to separate 
myself from my Cesarine; and she also, though happy 
with her husband, was yet sad enough to see me leave. 
Indeed, I was greatly troubled ; I felt peculiarly comfort¬ 
less ; but reflection reassures me. Still, it seems that we 
can never know positively, in this world, whether, in cer¬ 
tain cases, we have done right or wrong. God has willed 
it so, in order to keep us in proper humility and distrust 
of ourselves. I humbly commend to Him that dear child, 
whom I myself have left, surrounded, however, by an 
excellent family, full of all the cardinal virtues, and more 
especially the virtue of piety. 

“ They all seem disposed to love her very much. Her 
husband deserves and enjoys the greatest consideration. 
She loves him sincerely, although he is much older than 
she, and he has for her the warmest regard and attach¬ 
ment. She will be in the very best society of her hus¬ 
band’s section of the country, and many of the families 
there are both cultured and distinguished. Her income 
arising from her husband’s position and business is now 
quite sufficient, and the value of their landed property, 
though small at present, will increase with time. There 
is very little real luxury at Chambery, most of the for¬ 
tunes there being fairly and healthfully limited. There¬ 
fore I have every reason to be satisfied, believing that all 
is well. 

“It is now my Suzanne who chiefly engrosses my 
thoughts. She is a beauty of another order, but which 
is said to be matchless of its kind, and which excited the 
admiration and enthusiasm of much of the society of 
ChambSry, and of many of the young gentlemen of Pied- 


184 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


mont, where I had taken her in company with her sister 
on her wedding tour. On beholding her beautiful face 
and form for the first time, many persons really made 
exclamations of delight; but she is so guileless as not 
even to suspect the existence of her own visible perfec¬ 
tions. My husband’s family are already beginning to 
talk to me about a suitable match for Suzanne. Ah, if I 
could only soon see her well married, like my three elder 
daughters, and not so far away from me! And now, if 
Alphonse also would oivly marry, and marry prudently! 
Instead of a career which seems ever closed to him, I 
would at least, in this way, give him happiness.” 


cv. 

“ Macon, March 18, 1819. 

“I am back here once more, but not in peace, as I 
should like to be. On coming again into France I find 
that the different political parties are terribly excited 
against each other. Both my husband and myself are 
reproached bitterly, and sometimes sharply, for our mod¬ 
eration. It is supposed that we ought to participate in 
the discussions and angry feelings of the Royalist party, 
to which we belong; but such conduct on our part would 
not accord with our sense of decorum and duty. Es¬ 
tranged allies are not won back to their party by insulting 
them. My husband and myself have been obliged to 
withdraw from the society of many of our most respected 
friends, and to a great extent to shut ourselves up within 
ourselves. We are happy in the consciousness of being 
honestly and faithfully attached to the Bourbons, without 
losing, on their account, our self-possession, our judgment, 
or our souls. Are there not in all of us personal passions 
enough to combat, without kindling those unfortunate po¬ 
litical animosities which are now so greatly inflaming the 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. ^5 

minds of men? My husband says he shed his blood 
freely for the Bourbons on the 10th of August, and is 
ready to shed it again, but that he will not yield his own 
convictions of right action to the senseless rage of their 
partisans. He remains silent; he suffers. It is in this 
way, he says, that civil wars are bred. The enemies of 
the Bourbons seem to be no less irrational and unjust. 
Between these two parties we are in a manner objects of 
suspicion alike to both, and are almost totally proscribed 
and crushed. O Lord, shed abroad over all the land the 
spirit of peace and justice ! I find that Alphonse has 
again gone to Paris. What, I wonder, is he going to do 
there now?” 


cvi. 

0 June 11, 1819. 

“ To-day I saw Madame Bianco, of Italy. She is the 
most beautiful and attractive lady I have ever seen. 
There is a radiance about her face which is indescribably 
sweet, and at the same time lively, and which attracts the 
heart quite as much as it dazzles the eye. The tone of 
her voice, with its foreign accent, produces an emotion 
and a sort of sentimentality and tenderness which are 
peculiarly enchanting. She brought me news from Al¬ 
phonse, of whom she saw much at Paris, and recited 
some of his verses, which I did not recognize. They 
are religious and melancholy stanzas, in which is also 
discovered a great depth of passion.” 


evil. 

" Milly, September 4, 1819. 

“ Here again is Alphonse. His health is good ; but just 
now I have other anxieties on his account. At Chambery 
he has made the acquaintance of a young English lady, a 

Miss Birch, whom he is extremely wishful to marry. It 

16* 


i86 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


would seem that he has already succeeded in pleasing the 
young lady herself, and that they have mutually engaged 
themselves,—as much so, at least, as any two persons can 
who are still dependent on the will of their parent!. How 
strange are the ways of Providence in sometimes sporting 
with our thoughts! I was murmuring and despairing at 
seeing my son without occupation, and apparently without 
aim, wandering from one place to another, using up his 
time and vigor in useless vanities and in unhealthy day¬ 
dreams, when, lo, this same Providence presents to us 
suddenly, as it were, by His own hand, a foreign lady, 
who is highly accomplished, and who is able and anxious 
to control for good the heart of Alphonse, to aid him in 
the first important steps of an honorable career in life, 
and to make him happy ! As for any happiness pertain¬ 
ing to myself individually, I do not speak of it, for, for a 
long time, it has been almost entirely bound up in that 
of my son and my daughters. 

“Here is substantially what they write to me, from 
Chambery, about Miss Marianne Birch, the young Eng¬ 
lish lady, with whom Cesarine is well acquainted. With¬ 
out being a beauty (which is a gift often more dangerous 
than useful to its possessor), she is agreeable and grace¬ 
ful, with a fine figure and magnificent hair. She is 
naturally endowed with a superior mind, is remarkably 
well educated, and is distinguished for her rare accom¬ 
plishments. She belongs to a very good family in Eng¬ 
land, and her connections are all that one could reason¬ 
ably wish or expect. Her mother, who is a widow, 
without being rich, is in easy circumstances. She is 
an only daughter. Her father was a colonel of militia 
in England during the serious and exciting threats of 
invasion by Bonaparte. The French exiles were cor¬ 
dially received at their house in London; and they gave 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


187 

especial welcome to a persecuted lady of high rank, the 
Marchioness of La Pierre, who had been banished from 
Savoy, and who was pointed out to me at a reception 
given by the Governor of Savoy, when I was there at 
the time of the marriage of Cesarine. 

“ This lady of rank must, at one time, have been ex¬ 
ceedingly beautiful. She passed in England the whole 
period of the exile of the King of Sardinia, up to 1818. 
She has several daughters, who were born, or brought up, 
in London ; and these fair flowers of nobility have, ever 
since their childhood, lived like sisters with Miss Birch, 
their friend, who is now Alphonse’s sweetheart. Return¬ 
ing to Savoy, they invited her to come with them, to 
partake in turn of their own hospitality. They were 
naturally proud to show her their picturesque country, 
their castle, and the high esteem in which they are held 
in their province and on their large estates, which, in 
great part, have been restored to them. 

“ They are now all living together, in a beautiful 
country-seat with a large garden, at the extremity of one 
of the suburbs, only a few minutes’ walk from Chambery. 
Their castle is the place of meeting for all the literary 
and distinguished society of this pretty city; and there 
they spend their time in drawing and painting, with oc¬ 
casional diversions in music and horseback-riding. It 
is little else than an English country-seat transported to 
Savoy. 

“ Cesarine sometimes visits the distinguished and 
happy inmates of this castle; and her brother-in-law, 
Louis de Yignet, Alphonse’s friend, goes there very 
often. He himself writes poetry, and, now and then, 
reads it to the young ladies. He has also read to them 
some of Alphonse’s verses, which seemed to please them 
all. They have questioned him about his friend Al- 


i88 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


phonse, upon whom he has passed an exaggerated en¬ 
comium, comparing him to a young yet famous English 
poet, whose name I do not now remember, but who 
writes fantastic and mysterious poetry, much read and 
talked about just at this time. He promised the young 
ladies to bring his friend to see them when he should 
come to Chambery, on his return from Switzerland, 
where he then was, living alone in a fisherman’s cabin 
on the borders of Lake Zurich. 

“ It happened as follows. Alphonse, preceded by his 
much exaggerated renown, returned to Bissy, the country- 
seat of Colonel de Maistre, near Chambery. From there 
he came to Servolex, and then to Chambery, the house 
of his sister Cesarine. It was much like the accidental 
meeting in a romance. They were all curious to know 
the brother of the beautiful Cesarine. His personal 
appearance seemed to sustain fully the poetic sentiments 
which had already captivated their imagination. 

“ The young English lady did not conceal her high 
appreciation of the melancholy verses of the young 
Frenchman; and her mother, who does everything her 
daughter wishes, looked on her smilingly and approv¬ 
ingly when she gave expression to her judgment. In 
the course of a few weeks Alphonse became the favorite 
of the household. He persuaded Cesarine to speak to 
Madame La Pierre, who spoke to the mother of the 
young lady. But the difficulty which makes me tremble 
will come from our own side, and especially from my 
sisters-in-law. The young lady herself is a Protestant. 
But Cesarine reassures and consoles me. She is most 
anxious, indeed, to see her brother married, and tells me 
that the friend of the Misses La Pierre, who are them¬ 
selves very pious, has manifested, through their mutual 
intimacy in England, a predilection for their own re- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


189 


ligion, and that she would probably have already become 
a Catholic were it not for the fear of afflicting her 
mother. If she would solemnly promise Cesarine to be 
of our religion, and to educate her children in our faith, 
I think it would at once remove all difficulties on our 
side. 

“ How many troubles I shall have to contend with 
before it will be possible for me to overcome all these 
obstacles, and harmonize in the family so many opposing 
wishes ! What is more distasteful to a coterie of uncles 
and aunts, so severely moral and so coldly rational, than 
a romantic marriage with a foreigner ? I scarcely dare 
speak of it to my husband and his brothers; and, yet, 
without their consent the marriage will never take place. 
The entire fortune of the family is in their hands. Al¬ 
phonse has nothing but the small annuity provided for 
him by his father, and fifty thousand francs in reversion, 
after us, from Saint Point. All the large estates of my 
father-in-law belong to my brothers-in-law and sisters-in- 
law. If they will not settle a portion of the property 
on Alphonse in a marriage-contract, how can we fairly 
present the young man, without career and without for¬ 
tune, to a family richer than ourselves? With young 
people, love compensates for all things else; but it is not 
the young people who coldly formulate and deliberately 
execute the marriage-articles relating to property. At 
present, my brain and my eyes are alike unable to find 
the sleep they need.” 

cvm. 

“ November 9, 1819. 

“ Everything is broken off. Alphonse has returned to 
Milly, and the mother of the young English lady has 
taken her away to Turin to separate her from him whom 
she seems to love. Nevertheless, the young people write 


190 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


to each other occasionally. I feel very sad. My husband, 
tormented by our embarrassed circumstances in conse¬ 
quence of bad crops and the debts of his son, which must 
be paid previous to the celebration of any marriage what¬ 
ever, so as not to deceive the family with which he would 
be united, talks of retiring altogether to the country, and 
of selling his house and other property at Macon. If 
things are coming to this pass, how shall I ever be able to 
marry off my two remaining daughters? Who will come 
to seek them, whether in the heart or in the outskirts of a 
poor village ? Conversation with my husband on these 
subjects, and the fear of his selling our house, have caused 
me to shed many tears this evening. My two little girls, 
seeing me weep, without suspecting that it was in the 
least on their account, went out very quietly and shut 
themselves up in the cabinet of the Muses, next to my 
chamber. The wainscoting of this cabinet is constructed 
with appropriate niches, supporting the nine Muses carved 
in wood. Not seeing the children about, I entered the 
cabinet, and there surprised them, both on their knees, 
praying and weeping before God, that He might console 
me. Notwithstanding all my troubles, how truly happy I 
am to have such tender, affectionate, and pious daughters ! 
Yet at times I feel as if it renders me only the more un¬ 
fortunate not to be able to prepare for all my children a 
lot suitable to my longings and to their own merits!” 

cix. 

“ December 25, 1819. 

“ Alphonse left Milly, this morning, very sad and very 
anxious. The Baron de Mounier, who thinks a great 
deal of him, wrote him a letter, telling him to come 
immediately to Paris, as, at last, he had a fair prospect of 
getting him into the diplomatic service. The adminis- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


J 9 l 

tration has changed. Monsieur Pasquier is now the 
Minister for Foreign Affairs. Monsieur Mounier and 
Monsieur Rayneval, both of whom have a high opinion 
of my son, have, we trust, sufficient influence with Mon¬ 
sieur Pasquier to secure the appointment of Alphonse as a 
Secretary of Legation. Then he would at least be free to 
marry the lady he loves, and his career for the present 
would take the place of fortune. He has left us full of 
hope.” 

cx. 

" January 6, 1820. 

“ Nothing new from Paris, except that they write me 
that Alphonse is received there with distinction in the 
best society, where, according to the expression of Ma¬ 
dame de Vaux, my sister, both his person and his talents 
excite a sort of infatuation. She mentions the names of 
many good persons, whose mothers I knew in my youth, 
who overwhelmed him with attention. These are among 
the number: the Princess de Talmont, the Princess de 
Tremouille, Madame de Raigecourt, the friend of Ma¬ 
dame Elizabeth, Madame de Saint Aulaire, the Duchess 
de Broglie, daughter of Madame de Stael, Madame de 
Montcalm, sister of the Duke de Richelieu, and Madame 
de Dolomieu, whom I knew so well at the house of the 
Duchess of Orleans. Besides, she says, many eminent 
and influential gentlemen have condescended to offer him 
their friendship; yes, to him, the young provincial, who, 
but yesterday, was so obscure. Among the gentlemen 
thus named are the young Duke de Rohan, the virtuous 
Mathieu de Montmorency, Monsieur M0I6, Monsieur 
J^aine, who is said to be a great orator, Monsieur Ville- 
main, the pupil of Monsieur de Fontane, whom he sees 
at the house of Monsieur Decazes. Nevertheless, he is 
known to all these great people only by a kind of quiet 


192 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


rumor which sometimes precedes the merit and announces 
the fame of certain young men. 

“ Thou knowest, O Lord, that I am proud, very proud 
indeed, of all the unexpected and auspicious attentions 
which are now paid to my son; but Thou knowest like¬ 
wise that I do not ask for him what the world calls glory 
and honor, but rather that Thou wilt make him an honest 
and useful man, and one of Thy humble servants, like 
his father. All the rest is vanity; often worse than 
vanity. * ’ 

CXI. 

Here the manuscript is interrupted by a journey of this 
poor mother to Paris. Her friends there write to her that 
her son is sick with inflammation of the lungs. She starts 
at an early hour of the night of the 12th of February, with 
her daughter Suzanne, who was then only sixteen years 
of age, and whose general appearance was more like that 
of a guardian angel than a daughter of man. We see 
in her rapid memorandum and sketches of travel that at 
Chalons-on-the-Saone she was thrown into consternation 
by meeting on the wharf an indecent masquerade, in 
which all the objects of her pious veneration, religion, 
royalty, and modesty, were grossly travestied and scoffed 
at. Her heart shrinks at the sight of this foul and omi¬ 
nous procession, and she suffers at once a presentiment of 
impending disaster. In passing along the road near Au- 
xerre, a voice from a public carriage cries out the news 
of the assassination of the Duke de Berry. She arrives at 
Paris in the very midst of the emotion, confusion, and 
mourning. Happily, she finds her son convalescent. In 
his attic, he is surrounded by friends, who have given 
him the cares, the constant nursing, the tenderness, and 
the solicitous watchings by his pillow which at home he 
would have had from his own family. Her heart expands. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


193 


The first poems of her son have just appeared in a small 
volume. These poetic effusions have, in the course of a few 
days, caused his name to be recognized as of some account. 
No less a personage than Monsieur de Talleyrand, that 
disdainful and yet infallible critic and censor, has himself 
just sounded the signal for admiration. A friend of the 
happy mother brings to her a note, written the very day 
after the publication of her son’s volume, in which the 
great diplomatist writes as follows to a princess who had 
lent him the volume: “ I spent a part of last night in 
reading the book; and my long absence from sleep is an 
evidence of the interest it excited in me. I am not a 
prophet, and cannot tell what the public will think or 
feel; but my public, in this case, is my 6wn impression 
under the curtains of my bed. The book is the work of 
a man ; we will talk about it again.” 

Nor was this all. The friends of her son, confirmed in 
their good will by the applause of the whole public, both 
men and women, took advantage of the moment of enthu¬ 
siasm to besiege with solicitations the Minister for Foreign 
Affairs. Monsieur Pasquier, himself a very literary man, 
appointed the young poet Secretary of Legation at Naples. 
Monsieur Simeon, Minister of the Interior, sent, in the 
name of His Majesty Louis XVIII., a collection of 
Lemaire’s Latin classics, with the most flattering testi¬ 
mony of the satisfaction of this literary king. Further, 
of his own accord, and without solicitation, the king 
granted to the young Secretary a pension out of the funds 
for the encouragement of literature. This pension was 
designed to supply the insufficiency of the salary as Sec¬ 
retary of Legation. Life, fortune, ambition, glory, and 
especially universal friendship, all burst at once on this 
sensitive existence, so long ignored and retarded in its 
hopes, and so long left in disappointment and despair. 

1 17 


T 94 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


The mother’s heart now overflows with happiness. The 
fame of her son, the universal admiration at Paris of the 
beauty of her daughter Suzanne, the real joys of the pres¬ 
ent, the bright prospects for the future, and the hope 
of a long-contemplated and desirable matrimonial union 
for her son,—a union henceforth rendered easy by the 
constancy of the young English lady herself, and by the 
dazzling effect of so much celebrity and honor on the 
eyes of her hesitating mother, give a veritable intoxica¬ 
tion of pleasure to the pages of the journal during these 
three months. But these pages, covering the time men¬ 
tioned, are of too deep and sacred a nature to be quoted. 
For the most part they constitute an inviolable secret 
between her heart and her God. Still, there is one of 
them which, in reading it over to-day, strikes us by a 
strange and prophetic coincidence of circumstances and 
sentiments between the destiny of the mother and that of 
her son. 

On the evening of Easter, 1820, she writes that, suffo¬ 
cated as it were by her own and her children’s happiness, 
she felt the need of going, at nightfall, to pour out her 
swelling heart in thanksgivings and pious tears in the 
church of Saint Roch, where she had prayed so often in 
her younger days. She takes with her her daughter Su¬ 
zanne, and conceals herself in the shadow of a pillar to 
thank God for so many blessings bestowed upon her at 
once. The hymn which she writes in her journal, on 
returning from the church, is yet overflowing with the 
piety, the rejoicings and the tears, which, without doubt, 
she poured forth still more abundantly in that ecstasy 
of gratitude before God. All the sons of men should be 
able to read such lines, in order that they might see how 
much of anguish or of happiness they may occasion to 
the hearts of their mothers ! 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


*95 


CXII. 

On the 3d of July, 1820, she thus again opens her 
journal, after having been interrupted by weeks of travel, 
of care, of apprehension, and at last of sweet satisfaction. 

“ Macon, July 3, 1820. 

“ I have been so much and so anxiously occupied since 
the 31st of May, the last day I wrote in this journal, that 
I have not yet been able to note down, as it deserves, a 
most interesting and important event; an event, by the 
way, so much desired and so little expected,—the mar¬ 
riage of my son. It was celebrated on the 6th of June, 
in the chapel of the Governor of Chambery. I returned 
from Chambery on Friday, the 2d instant. My daughter- 
in-law passed in perfect retirement many of the days im¬ 
mediately preceding her marriage. The ceremony took 
place at eight o’clock in the morning, in presence of the 
Governor and his wife, the Governor’s Aide-de-Camp, 
the Marchioness La Pierre and her daughters, all four of 
them, the Count de Maistre, Monsieur de Vignet, his 
sister, Mademoiselle Olympe, and the Bishop of Annecy. 
The Abbot of Etiola performed the ceremony. My 
daughter-in-law was dressed, with all possible propriety, 
in a very beautiful vesture of embroidered muslin, and a 
splendid lace veil, which almost entirely covered her. It 
is impossible for any countenance to have been more 
expressive of dignity, modesty, and grace, or of piety. 

“ I cannot tell all the happiness, and yet deep concern, 
which I felt in seeing my son come at last to this most 
important epoch of his life. In his behalf I prayed God 
with great fervency, but am continually reproaching my¬ 
self for not having prayed enough yet. How many ardent 


196 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


prayers of gratitude and of joy a mother, who realizes at 
last such a happy moment for her son, can at once hold in 
her heart! Her work upon the earth is finished on the 
day when she sees the happiness of all her children well 
secured. I have yet two more daughters whom I long to 
see at the foot of the altar in this touching ceremony. 
A marriage has already been proposed for my beautiful 
Suzanne. Happy, happy the man for whom God destines 
such an angel in human form ! 

“Alphonse, with his wife and mother-in-law, after the 
double ceremony ^Catholic and Protestant) at Chambery 
and at Geneva, has started for Italy. He is slowly on 
his way to his post of duty in Naples, under the Duke of 
Narbonne. 

“ I have brought back with me my poor C6sarine, who 
is now very ill, in order to consult a physician for her at 
Lyons, on our way to Macon. God seems to be sending 
me new sorrows now, somewhat in proportion to my recent 
excess of happiness. I have also found again my poor 
friend Madame Paradis (who has been a sort of second 
sister to me) in the last extremities of disease. Alas, I 
had too much reason to expect the fatality of her illness. 
I have watched her, day and night, for two weeks. She 
could not rest except when I was with her. She expired 
in my arms ! What a devoted friend I have lost in her! 
I have had the heartfelt satisfaction of inspiring her with 
a faith and resignation which she did not possess so fully 
as I at the beginning of our friendship. She died in the 
hope and, I think I may truly say, in the joy of the Lord. 
What an unfillable void this loss makes around me ! She 
lived at Macon, just opposite our own windows; and upon 
the least sign of trouble or grief in my face she would 
always come immediately to share at least half of it. As 
an evidence of her unspeakable affection for me, she has 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


197 


left me a considerable legacy. It was her desire and pur¬ 
pose to give me all her property, not having herself either 
brother or sister; but to this proposition on her part I 
would not consent. I promised, however, to accept of 
her little pleasure-ground, known as Saint Clement, just 
outside of the city limits of Macon. 

*‘ Without this incomparable friend, who used to divine 
my wants for my children, who sought out my sorrows in 
the very depths of my heart, who was fain to forget her¬ 
self in her eagerness to assist me, and who very often 
sacrificed herself beyond her means, what would some¬ 
times have become of me and mine? Oh, may our affec¬ 
tion, which was so enduring on earth, become eternal in 
heaven! I will never pass an evening nor a morning 
without praying for her soul; and when I see, before my 
window, on the other side of the street, her own window 
always closed, or always occupied by other faces, how my 
heart would break if I did not hope and believe that I 
shall see her again in heaven! 

“ What do I not owe to my many good friends here 
below ? I believe in my heart that true friendship is a 
visible form and attribute of Providence ! When we are 
moved by a spirit of good will toward others, God him¬ 
self seems to hear us, speak to us, understand us, and 
shelter us, more securely than ever, in the hearts of our 
own friends. By a rare privilege, I have had excellent 
friends in every period of my life. When they have 
been taken away from me, I cannot think that I have 
lost them entirely; they are so often present with me. 
I have a very dear and charming one just now in the 
person of the young and beautiful Madame Delahante. 
In spite of the difference in our respective ages, she has 
adopted me as a second mother; and I see in her another 
daughter.” 

17* 


198 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


CXIII. 

“ Sunday, July 16, 1820. 

“ Some unwise women of the village, who had heard 
that the newspapers were publishing rumors of the assas¬ 
sination of Alphonse, by highway-robbers, on the road 
between Rome and Florence, were cruel enough to come 
to me, in tears, to repeat the false news. It appears that 
the journals which contained this seemingly tragic ad¬ 
venture, of which I cannot conceive the origin, had been 
kept from me. Fortunately, however, I received from Al¬ 
phonse himself, this morning, a letter of a later date than 
that ascribed to the reported calamity, and was thus re¬ 
assured, so to speak, before being surprised or alarmed. 
Yet I was much moved by the mere rumor alone. What 
would have become of me if I had not received that 
letter? and how similar false reports, spread by faithless 
journalists, might cause the death of many mothers ! I 
am anxiously waiting for another letter; for I cannot help 
fearing that there may have been some foundation for the 
rumor, and that Alphonse is trying to conceal from me 
all knowledge of the peril which he has escaped ! Through 
his friend, Monsieur de Virieu, I have already learned 
that he was dreading to meet in Italy a certain rash and 
wicked man, who declares that he cannot and will not 
forgive him for his marriage. Can it be that ? or some¬ 
thing else? I know not. May God bless and protect 
him and his wife, even as I bless them, but as He alone is 
able to protect them !” 


cxiv. 

Having returned to her retreat at Milly, after so many 
emotional events, she here repines, in two or three notes 
of her journal, at the great void which she finds around 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


199 


her in consequence of the marriage of her daughters and 
of her son. Then again she is saddened at the thought 
of her repining, since these absences are only the condi¬ 
tions of their own happiness. Her son gives her anxiety, 
because he found himself thrown (though unavoidably) 
into the midst of the revolution at Naples. The political 
agitations of France, under a system of violently antago¬ 
nistic parties, each striving to snatch the power from the 
hands of the other, cause her to turn her thoughts upon 
matters of government. These passionate and perilous 
agitations make her regret the unity of power, and the 
silent discipline, of a patriarchal monarchy. We give 
here her own reflections, without presuming to criticise 
them. Alike in religion and in politics, a son may cherish 
the sentiments of his mother without blindly embracing 
her dogmas. The son, as he grows up to manhood, is 
not fed, like an infant, on milk from his mother’s breast 
or from the nurse’s bottle, but on bread and meat fit for 
full-grown men. 

Still, it is impossible not to recognize the fact that a 
strong unity of power, whether it be lodged in the dele¬ 
gates of the people, according to the Republicans, or in 
a king, according to the Monarchists, seems to be more 
logical and more advantageous to society than the heated 
antagonisms of the mixed system which, at that time, was 
called the Constitutional System. We cannot well dis¬ 
guise from ourselves the fact that this sort of government 
keeps the various parties in a continual state of war, or 
of dissension and tumult bordering on war. Now, there 
can never be war without exciting general hatred in the 
heart, and mutual hatred always proves itself to be a fatal 
element in society. It is in thoughts akin to these that 
we find the foundation of the ideas of this holy woman. 
Hatred is opposed tc We; God is love; therefore gov- 


200 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


ernments which, in times of peace and without provoca¬ 
tion, train and organize their citizens for war, are based 
on principles in conflict with the laws of God. To an 
instinct so straightforward and pious, only one answer can 
be made. It is this: Unhappily, mankind are so consti¬ 
tuted that nations are obliged to choose between peace 
and liberty, and liberty is just as precious and divine as 
peace. Let us read: 

“What a wretched sort of government it is under which 
we are now living, and which we are obliged to respect 
and obey, simply because it is the will of the king that it 
shall be so! It appears to operate in a manner altogether 
contrary to' the peace and charity which ought always to 
prevail among Christians. People seem to be occupied 
almost exclusively in mutually and bitterly criticising 
each other, and in revealing everything bad that they can 
find out about each other. Great excesses are permitted 
under the pretext of considerations for the public good; 
the conscience is warped; the heart becomes really cor¬ 
rupt; and men, naturally inclined to evil, find plausible ex¬ 
cuses for abandoning themselves, without restraint, to their 
own wicked inclinations. Friendly and unselfish social 
intercourse becomes wellnigh impracticable. People are 
all the while measuring their own forces, and plotting 
and rising against each other, every one keenly suspecting 
and fearing his neighbor. A false shame, a spirit of dis¬ 
simulation, comes to mingle its poison in the already 
deadly cup. Men and women alike learn to speak one 
thing and think another. They lack the magnanimity 
to defend the absent who are unjustly accused, because 
they are themselves afraid of being treated like those who 
have already had the misfortune to become the victims 
of slander and persecution. Corruption and injustice are 
thus running wild throughout the land; and I who deeply, 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


201 


very deeply, feel all this, even I, am being spoiled, and 
am becoming less loving and less gentle in my dispo¬ 
sition. Yet it seems to me that it is only against the 
more wicked that I have become severe in my thoughts 
and words and conduct; but those whom I blame quickly 
justify themselves, as against others, by professions of 
belief in the same thoughts and conclusions which affect 
me! 

“O God, give me back again my peace of mind, cause 
me to avoid everything which I ought to shun, and help 
me to separate myself as much as possible from the fever¬ 
ish uneasiness and consuming restlessness of the age which 
must be so odious in Thy sight! My political system 
depends, and must ever depend, on my religion. This 
teaches me to believe that the purely monarchical form 
of government is the best, because it is that of which 
Thou gavest the model to the world when Thou didst 
graciously undertake to govern Thy chosen people, the 
Israelites of old, and when, in the hardness of their 
hearts, they asked another than Thee for their king. A 
king given by Thee is absolutely Thine image; he must 
carefully preserve all his power and all his authority; the 
more he shares his divine prerogatives with his people, 
the more he excites their envy and their passions. 

* 4 After all, is not a well-administered monarchy only 
a large family, whose king is a father ? and what father, 
who is wise, will allow each of his children to pass judg¬ 
ment on his conduct, and on the motives which influence 
him in his several purposes and operations? What pru¬ 
dent father would give his children the right to find fault 
with everything, to speak and write anything and every¬ 
thing, whether against his system of family government 
or against their own brethren, even though it should be 
under the mutually understood condition of their incur- 

i* 


202 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


ring punishment if they spoke or judged wrongly? Would 
he not do infinitely better to anticipate and guard against 
the inevitable mistakes and wrong-doings of his children 
than to have to reprove and punish them after the fact, 
»nd thereby introduce unpleasant, if not fatal, misunder¬ 
standings and bickerings among them? Would such a 
father be truly a wise man ? and would his conduct be in 
accordance with the laws of God and the rules of charity? 
This, however, with no less degree of general impropriety 
and incorrectness, is the true picture of a 1 constitutional 
government,’ such as we now have. But, I repeat it, 
we ought to be silent, respectful, and prayerful; for, in a 
general way, nothing is worse, nothing is more culpable, 
than to talk and act against an established government. 
If we be true to ourselves, we can work out our salva¬ 
tion, wherever, or under whatever circumstances, the hand 
of God has placed us. My opinions, therefore, for the 
present, must be allowed to have no further influence than 
to restrain me from taking part in the great evils which 
are now being done. For this reason I must henceforth 
enter less into political discussions and more and more 
into solitude, reflection, and prayer. Prayer especially 
is the true policy for me. 

“ Alphonse is spending the summer on the island of 
Ischia, situated in the Gulf of Gaeta, of which he has 
sent me delightful descriptions. I myself am filled with 
anxiety about the health of Cesarine, and the marriage of 
my dear Suzanne, who is now almost twenty-one years of 
age. We cannot now give her much of a fortune, and 
unless I soon take for her every possible advantage which 
may be gained from a proper presentation in society of 
that incomparable flower of beauty, which may rightly 
fascinate the heart of an honest man, and which is also 
a gift from God, to be taken while He is offering it, it 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


203 

seems to me that I shall come short of my duty as a 
mother. 

“ This year I have taken upon myself the habit of 
going to church very early in the morning, often before 
daylight, to hear mass. It seems to me eminently fitting 
to devote these opening moments of the day, free alike 
from the confusion and the pleasures of the world, to God, 
thus rendering first unto God that which belongs to God, 
and then unto the world that which belongs to the world. 
Sometimes I feel great reluctance in leaving my soft pil¬ 
low and the mild temperature of my chamber to go out, 
in any and every kind of weather, to attend what is here 
called the Mass of the Poor and the Mass of the Servants. 
But are we not all equally in the grace and power of God ? 
and are not all of us the servants of our fathers, and of 
our husbands, and of our own children ? After entering 
the church, however, I am always well rewarded by the 
calm reverence and satisfaction which I feel in that min¬ 
gled light and shade, by more fervency in my prayers, by 
greater tranquillity of soul, and by the additional strength 
which I find for all the remaining duties of the day. It 
would be my own individual taste and desire to live in 
still more complete retirement; but when I consider that 
I have yet two daughters to marry off, I am convinced 
of the propriety of mingling occasionally with them in 
the world, of which even after me they and theirs are to 
form a part. Taking this view of the matter, I am led 
to believe that I am in the right path, and, so believing, 
I reassure myself accordingly.” 

cxv. 

" January 27, 1821. 

“ Alphonse writes me from Rome that he is perfectly 
happy. This, though, is not the language I was long 


204 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


accustomed to hear him speak; it must therefore be true 
(as I trust it is), since he says so himself. He sends me 
some money for his poor friend, the Abbot Dumont, cu¬ 
rate of Bussiere, whom he has always loved very dearly, 
and who is now struggling with both disease and destitu¬ 
tion. This mark of remembrance, coming from one so 
far away, for a needy friend whom it would not be strange 
if he had forgotten in the midst of his present diversions 
and happiness, touches me to the heart.” 

cxvi. 

" March n, 1821. 

“ Good news! I now hope and expect to see my 
beautiful Suzanne happily married and comfortably set¬ 
tled quite near me. Monsieur de Montherot, one of our 
distant relatives, thirty-six years of age, who is endowed 
with a fine countenance and a superior mind, was struck 
by her beauty and graces in an interview which he had 
indirectly sought. This marriage should make me happy, 
both on account of the good qualities of the husband 
and the nearness of their home. His estates are in Loire 
and Burgundy. May the suit succeed ! My husband is 
favorably disposed. Suzanne herself does not yet know 
that she is the object of all these close interviews and 
strange whisperings; yet she is so candid, so pure, so 
obedient, that I have no doubt of her consent whenever 
I may speak to her on the subject. ’ ’ 

cxvi 1. 

" March 21,1821. 

“ More good news a few days later! God gives on the 
one hand and takes away on the other. Let us render 
hearty thanks for His gifts, and submit cheerfully to His 
refusals. I have a grandson! My daughter-in-law was 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


205 


safely delivered, at Rome, on the 8th of March, of a boy, 
as beautiful as an angel, as his father informs us. They 
have already named him after his father, Alphonse. He 
was baptized in the great church so universally known as 
Saint Peter’s. His godfather is a nobleman of Naples, 
the Marquis Gagliati, and his godmother is the Polish 
Princess Oginska. This news has made me supremely 
happy. They say the infant is like me; then I picture 
him to myself as his father was when I first saw him, 
thirty years and six months ago. His mother has herself 
undertaken to nurse him, and I sincerely hope she may 
succeed. They will come to visit us as soon as she shall 
have sufficiently recovered.” 

CXVIII. 

“ May 12, 1821. 

“I have told everything to Suzanne, who, it seems, 
however, had already come to learn something of the game 
which we were playing in her behalf. She is virtue and 
reason combined in perfection. I trust that it may please 
God to send her him who can and will make her happy. 
While waiting for the nuptials, her imagination is so well 
disciplined, her heart is so pure, and she is so devoted to 
all her duties, domestic and religious, that she does not 
seem to experience an instant of trouble nor the least 
disquietude. She has an evenness of temper, a strength 
of character, and a peace of mind which enchant me.” 

Here occurs an interruption of three years in my 
mother’s manuscript. Some of the volumes of her jot¬ 
tings may have been mislaid, or the anguish in which she 
passed these three years, made desolate as they were by 
the death of Cesarine, who slowly wasted away at Cham- 
b6ry, after the birth of her third child, and which was 
further saddened by the fatal disease of her dear and 

18 


206 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


beautiful Suzanne, may have left her neither the necessary 
leisure nor the moral strength to record her sorrows and 
her tears. During these years her son and daughter-in- 
law had made a trip to France, and another to England, 
and, meanwhile, had lost their little boy. They had a 
daughter also, the idol of both her mother and her grand¬ 
mother, and the delight of us all. This daughter seemed 
destined to recall, in almost every respect, the likeness of 
that naturally noble grandmother, who preserved all her 
beauty and dignity even while far advancing in age. 

After the most diligent and thorough searching, I have 
failed to find any more manuscript until we come to the 
date of June 9, 1824. Under that date the first two or 
three pages are little else than the echoes of deep sobs. 
They were written at the bedside of her dear dying Su¬ 
zanne, amid all the varying emotions of hope and fear 
caused by the frequent phases of her sickness. It is a 
long and heart-rending agony, recorded hour by hour, 
until that last awful moment when the gates of heaven 
were opened to an angel, and the earth was darkened to 
an inconsolable mother. I will here extract only a few 
of these sad notes, which are but too monotonous in their 
despairing accents. 

cxix. 


“June 9, 1824. 

* Under a very great affliction, I am now beginning to 
write a new volume of my manuscript; my heart being 
continually lacerated by the almost hopeless condition of 
my poor Suzanne. For several days it seemed as if the 
disease was making no further progress, and I had a little 
respite; but yesterday I was again in despair; her weak, 
wan, and wasted appearance having struck me most poign¬ 
antly. Oh, this poor child, so calm, so gentle, so good, 
and yet so full of sorrow! Her husband was also very 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


207 


much overcome with grief; for, like me, he had allowed 
himself to hope against hope, in spite of all the unmis¬ 
takable signs which, long ago, should have convinced us 
of our self-deception. 

“ Our friends and relatives have been with us all day, 
and I am touched to the very depths of my heart by the 
tender sympathy and interest which they manifest. Still, 
in calling my attention so continuously to my griefs, their 
coming frequently has an effect quite contrary to what 
they intend. How I sigh for deliverance, as if, indeed, 
we could ever escape from sorrow in this world! I forget 
too often that human life is only a period of probation. 
Oh, in the light of all these terrible trials and sufferings 
of my poor Suzanne, I ought to be able to see clearly how 
necessary it is to be purified of all our faults, even the 
smallest of them, in order to secure admittance to heaven. 
I think sometimes that this disease may be the purgatory 
of our dear child; and if even she, who appears to us so 
innocent and so pure, is obliged to undergo such purga¬ 
tion, what may not we ourselves expect? Everything 
seems to be a cause of pain to her, even the little food 
which she is able to eat. 

“Our only hope now is in miracles; but these always 
seem possible to those who ask for them as I do. The 
Prince of Hohenlohe, in whose prayers, at this time, all 
Europe has so much faith, will celebrate the holy sacrifice 
in her behalf on the 20th of this month. In his prayers, 
which are said to be so efficacious, we will all unite with 
spirit and fervor, on the same day and at the same hour, 
in our church here. Oh, may we obtain from God the 
great and miraculous blessing which we thus seek ! 

“Alphonse and his wife are in Switzerland. I have 
written to them to return here, in order that I may not 
be left entirely alone and comfortless in that dread event 


208 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


which I cannot anticipate without despair, although I now 
see it pre-announced as inevitable, in the sweet face of my 
poor, dear, dying, saint-like Suzanne.’* 


cxx. 

“July i, 1824. 

“Yesterday we left the country-seat which our good 
friends, the Cortemberts, had lent us, at Perriere, on the 
hill overlooking Macon and the Saone. The moving was 
very painful to Suzanne; but I have been thinking, for 
some time, that I might, perhaps, save her life by bring¬ 
ing her back to our own house at Macon. I have estab¬ 
lished her in my own chamber, where she is as well off as 
she can well be for fresh air and quietude; and in the 
evening we have her carried, for a little while, into the 
garden. I do not myself see any callers; and we are 
almost as retired here as if we were all in the country. 

“Our mass here, for Suzanne’s recovery, on the 20th 
ultimo, at the same hour as that performed by Prince 
Hohenlohe, was very edifying; but everything now tells 
me that there is no longer any hope; no, not even in 
prayer. I cannot think, with any composure of mind, 
how this angel will leave our abode, or what bed she will 
sleep in when she changes from mine! 

“Alphonse, his wife, and their little Julia have just 
arrived. I find my own likeness perfectly portrayed in 
the person of this little child. What a great happiness 
it is to see ourselves, in old age, living over again and 
blooming afresh in the pretty little faces of our children’s 
children ! It is myself in great part whom I love in this 
beautiful child ! She is truly my very self, as I was at her 
age; as I was in my innocence; as I was in the bright 
morning of life. 

“ Suzanne, who, even now, is an angel, received the 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


209 


last offices of the Church on Monday, with all the solemn 
rites of this sacred but sorrowful ceremony. I was appre¬ 
hensive that she might be much disturbed by it ; but, by 
the grace of God, she was free from every fear, and seemed 
to receive into her heart a double portion of heavenly 
piety and peace. During the whole day her spirit seemed 
to be overflowing with an inexhaustible fund of happiness; 
and in the evening she said to us, 4 Let us now speak of 
my tranquillity of soul; I am happy; I have done all I 
could for the purification of my conscience, and all I 
could for the restoration of my health. God will do now 
according to His own good pleasure; and I confidently 
commit myself and all my interests into His hands.’ Never¬ 
theless, she always entertains great hopes of regaining her 
health; and as' she is well prepared to go at any time she 
may be called, it would seem to be a useless cruelty to dis¬ 
sipate her harmless delusions. In the midst of my griefs, 
I have experienced a great pleasure in the return here of 
Alphonse and Marianne, whom I found in much better 
health than I expected. They arrived on Thursday, the 
29th ultimo, and started again for Saint Point on the fol¬ 
lowing Saturday. The walking and talking in or about the 
house, of several persons at the same time, always annoys 
my Suzanne, in spite of every precaution I may take. 

“Alphonse came back on Tuesday, and remained with 
us until yesterday. He will return again on Monday, 
and will be away from us as little as possible during these 
distressful times. His kindness of heart and his manly 
courage are to me, at this time, the greatest of all worldly 
consolations.” 


CXXI. 


"July 14,1824. 

“ Suzanne is now in the fold of the Great Shepherd. 
She died day before yesterday, Thursday, at ten o’clock 

18* 


210 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


in the evening. I would like to recall as fully as possible 
all the circumstances of that death, so edifying, so sweet, 
so full of consolation for every true Christian, and yet so 
indescribably heart-breaking for a poor mother. In the 
midst of my affliction, of my extreme anguish, and of the 
most soul-harrowing scenes, God m His great mercy has 
given me a fund of fortitude at which I am even myself 
astonished, and which must certainly be the blessed re¬ 
sult of the numerous and earnest prayers which have been 
offered up for us by our pious friends. Particularly did 
I notice the efficacy of these prayers by the wonderfully 
happy condition of mind and heart of my poor Suzanne 
during the latter part of her life. 

“In spite of the sad state of emaciation and suffering 
to which her body was reduced, of which I gave a very 
imperfect description the other day, and which became 
worse and worse until the very last moment of her life, 
—in spite of all this, not a single complaint ever escaped 
her lips, nor a single sigh, nor other sign of distress. On 
the contrary, she was thoughtful of everything for us and 
for others, even going so far as to try to assuage our 
grief. On Sunday morning, seeing that she was very 
sick, I sent to request the curate to come to see her, as if 
of his own accord. She was very glad to see him, and 
while we were all in her presence, she said to me, 
* Mother, can I say everything before you ? I am afraid 
of giving you pain; but I think that the sacrament of 
extreme unction is a grace which ought not to be 
neglected, and I would like to receive it.* My wishing 

* The translator does not indorse, nor hold herself responsible for, 
these religious opinions; nor for any other similar or kindred opinions 
expressed in this book. She has only observed and maintained a fair 
fidelity to the original work, which, with the exception of a few passages 
here and there, she claims is of rare excellence.—M. L. H. 



MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


211 


this is no sign that my sickness is worse; only it seems 
to me best to be safe.’ 

“ She had already, while we were at Perriere, and 
without my knowing anything about it, asked the curate 
not to let her die without first giving her all the sacra¬ 
ments. He then took advantage of her having previously 
spoken to him on the subject; and, after talking to her 
in such a way as to make her feel all the benefits of this 
last comfort, he went out to prepare everything necessary 
for the ceremony, and soon afterward returned and sol¬ 
emnly administered to her the sad but holy sacrament of 
extreme unction. She received the rite with a faith and 
piety really angelic, and requested that no one would tell 
her husband, who was, fortunately, absent at the time. 
Mademoiselle de Lamartine and Sophie were present, 
and I myself was concealed in a closet on the side of her 
chamber, overwhelmed with grief, but yet not an entire 
stranger to divine peace and protection. In dread of its 
coming, I had often thought of this terrible moment, and 
feared that I might not be able to support myself through 
it. I have never again been the same person since the 
close of that solemnly significant ceremony. 

“ Suzanne herself was almost gay. I said two or three 
prayers for her, and read several exhortations with the 
same mutual calmness as if it had been simply an ordi¬ 
nary act of life. Sometimes she inquired, with a smile, 
about different persons, ‘ Do they know the secret ?’ 
The next day she asked for a little cross, on which an 
embossed representation of Christ could be distinctly 
seen. Although she had one in relief in her chamber, 
and had also an image of Him near her bed, yet she 
wanted one in her hand, so that she might kiss it fre¬ 
quently. Fortunately, I found a little silver crucifix, 
such as she desired, and from that moment until she 


212 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


died she never let it go out of her hand. She kissed it 
very often, and we saw her eyes wander almost every 
instant from the crucifix to the regions above. She never 
took the slightest nourishment, medicine, nor other thing, 
without making the sign of the cross both before and 
afterward. Every other moment, when things were quiet, 
she would ask me to say prayers; and I did so, making 
them up as best I could out of my own head and heart, 
or as God inspired me; and at other times I read to her 
a few verses from some of the more consoling and sublime 
Psalms. 

“ Whenever she became involved in one of her crises 
of unusual fatigue or suffocation, which we now think 
must have been the pangs of death, she was yet calm, and 
found immediate consolation in prayer. So passed her 
three last days on earth. Her nights were not entirely 
without repose. We generally left her about eight or nine 
o’clock with an attendant, a good, trusty woman, who 
slept in her chamber, and an excellent girl, almost saintly 
in her goodness, who has been with us more than twenty 
years, and who slept in an adjoining closet. Sophie and 
I would get up alternately several times during the night, 
to see how she was doing. Although she was so well pre¬ 
pared to go, yet she seemed reluctant to abandon all hope 
of staying. She never spoke of her child, and never once 
asked to see it. I am sure that this can be accounted for 
only through a spirit of self-sacrifice on her own part. 
On the evening preceding her death she said to her hus¬ 
band, ‘ Oh, my dear husband, how fortunate it is for one 
in my situation to have done everything which could be 
done, and to have peace in the heart! If you will do 
the same thing whenever you may be prostrated by dis¬ 
ease, you will do well;’ and she repeated several times, 
* You promise me to do so, do you not ?’ 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


213 


“The day before she died she received the benediction 
for the moment of death. She received my motherly 
blessing every evening from Monday till Thursday. I 
thought that nearly every hour of the day would be her 
last; and when evening came, it seemed as if I had, in 
some way, gained a great deal of strength; and so I felt 
less anxiety for the night. On Thursday evening her 
depression became very great, and we had to put her on 
another bed. Changing her from one bed to another was 
a thing we did but seldom; for there was always danger 
that she might expire in the effort and distress which it 
caused her. My poor Sophie took charge of all these 
changes and other manipulations, with a patience, a skill, 
and a gentleness which never left her during the whole 
period of her sister’s sickness. God will bless her for 
all the sweet and sisterly care which she has thus given. 
From time to time, on Thursday, she fell into light rev¬ 
eries. In the morning she said to me, 1 Mother, I have 
had some unpleasant dreams about you; are you well ?’ 
I told her yes, and asked her what she had dreamed. 

* Accidents . . .’ she said, but seemed to be unable to 
give any further expression to her ideas. 

“ The curate came, and she said to him, in a low voice, 

* I am afraid I am now too desirous of dying, because I 
feel myself so ready and so full of faith, that, if I should 
live, I could hardly ever again be so well prepared, and 
I might have to commence over again all this preparation 
for the salvation of my soul. Yet perhaps it is only las¬ 
situde which makes me feel thus.’ 

“Alphonse was present with us all the while, and tried 
in vain to conceal his tears and the emotions of his voice. 
She spoke to him sometimes, and affectionately held out 
her hands to him. She blessed her little boy, who was 
absent from the chamber, saying, ‘ Oh, let him be brought 


214 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


up in the faith which enables me to bear so resignedly 
my separation from him, from his father, from my mother, 
and from all my dear, dear friends!’ 

“I cannot express my feelings at seeing just then the 
sweetness of her smile as her eyes encountered mine. 
It seemed to light up and quicken, all of a sudden, her 
features, which were formerly so glorious in their heavenly 
beauty, but which now, alas, are so dull and lifeless, no 
longer transfigured by the effulgence of her soul. 

“ It was generally I who prayed aloud in the chamber, 
her brother, on his knees near the door, silently listening 
and joining in the prayer with us. These occasions were 
very touching. 

“Toward seven o’clock, her reveries became longer, 
and she seemed disposed to sleep; so I myself retired 
for a little while, in order to obtain, if possible, a few 
moments’ rest, after so much care and sleeplessness. At 
midnight I was awakened by a terrible storm, which 
seemed to shake and threaten the roof above our heads. 
Rising, I ran immediately to listen at Suzanne’s door, 
not daring to open it, for fear of disturbing her. Hear¬ 
ing nothing, I flattered myself that the storm had not 
awakened her. At four o’clock in the morning, I went 
there again, and found everything perfectly still, as be¬ 
fore ; but this time I made a little noise, to attract the 
attention of some one in the room, when one of the 
women, opening the door only wide enough to speak 
face to face, told me that the night had passed very 
quietly, and that my Suzanne was resting so peacefully 
that she needed nothing. Alas, this information was only 
too true; but I received it literally, and retired again 
until five o’clock. Then, with a strange sort of presenti¬ 
ment, and no longer able to restrain myself, I entered the 
chamber, where, just then, they were not expecting me. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


215 


There I saw Philiberte, my saint-like servant-girl, of whom 
I have but too briefly spoken elsewhere, on her knees be¬ 
fore the bed, where candles were burning. Still, I did 
not even then realize the whole truth, but thought that 
she had only asked again for prayers, and that they were 
there saying them. Sophie and Alphonse, however, with 
speechless sorrow, led me away; and then the terrible 
truth flashed over me instantly, and I knew, without a 
word from any one, that her spirit was no longer upon 
the earth. . . . 

“They had to send away her sorrow-stricken husband, 
who was unable to endure calmly so great an excess of 
grief. I ran and kissed in his cradle her poor little 
Charles, who was there sleeping peacefully, and who did 
not suspect in the least that he had just lost a most beau¬ 
tiful and loving mother. Alphonse alone stayed in the 
house, to see that the last dutiful attentions were paid to 
his sister’s remains. . . . 

“ Philiberte and the other watcher have told me all the 
events of that last fatal night. Suzanne’s dying moments 
were calm and sweet, without even a touch of the agony 
which we so often dread. Some time after we ourselves 
had retired, she said to her watchers, 4 Why do you not 
lie down ?’ Accordingly, they withdrew back of her bed, 
as if acting heedfully upon her suggestion. From there, 
after a few moments, they saw her kiss her little cross, and 
then heard a few sighs more deeply drawn than usual. 
Her voice was never heard again. Everything was stilled 
in death. It was then nearly ten o’clock, and the two 
women resolved not to say anything to me about it until 
morning. In this way did the soul of my poor Suzanne 
pass upward to its heavenly home. 

“ My grief is not now extremely bitter. Nearly every 
day for a year past I have mourned in advance over a 


2 l6 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


calamity which I tried hard to banish from my thoughts, 
but which, nevertheless, I could not fail to see but too 
clearly and too constantly in spite of all my efforts to the 
contrary. At present I do not weep at all. Perhaps the 
reason of this is because I am in that first great stupor 
and numbness in which we do not feel the severity of 
the blow because we have already been subjected to its 
paralyzing force. O my God, take me also! I do not 
care to live any longer except for that all-glorious heaven 
which I have pointed out to my two daughters, whence 
now they are calling to me, and where they are wait¬ 
ing for the proper occasion to introduce me ! Families 
may indeed be abruptly separated here on earth, but if 
they are good they will be reunited in heaven for all 
eternity. I keep for myself the little cross which they 
found in her hand, frequently kissing it with veneration, 
and am resolved not to part with it until the day of my 
own death. 

“ I am now at Saint Point with Alphonse. All of us 
here are now reading Fenelon. In the present condition 
of our minds we can read no other books than those 
which treat of things above. All other things seem to 
us so vain and come so far short of our desire. 

“ What could I do now without Sophie, my youngest 
daughter, who is always so gay and so charming ? And 
then there is my dear and fruitful Cecilia, who multiplies 
herself with all reasonable regularity and rapidity, as if 
to fill up the empty places caused by the dead and by 
those otherwise absent.” 

Here again occurs another long interruption, during 
which time she speaks only of the many absences and 
returns of her son, and of the great anxieties which she 
begins to feel on account of the growing weakness of her 
husband. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


217 


CXXII. 

“Tuesday, December 4,1824. 

“ Alphonse has returned from Paris without having been 
elected to the French Academy. Monsieur Droz gained 
the vacant seat, and I myself have been feeling very badly 
about it, because I urged Alphonse so earnestly to present 
himself for it; and more especially on my husband’s 
account, for he too took a deliberate and lively interest 
in the hoped-for success of our son’s candidacy. But 
God and men have willed it otherwise, and it is our duty 
to accept the result without bitterness and without mur¬ 
muring. However painful this ephemeral disappointment 
may be, it is as nothing in comparison with the deep 
sorrows of the heart.” 

CXXIII. 

“ Tuesday, January 4, 1825. 

“ The calls and compliments and joys and commotions 
of New Year’s day have unsettled my nerves very much. 
Nothing brings back to us what we have lost. In receiv¬ 
ing some of the kindest wishes of the day, I could not 
restrain myself from weeping at the thoughts they sug¬ 
gested. A preponderating share of my worldly happiness 
is in the past. Who will, who can, restore to me the 
past? 

“ I had a moment’s hope of having a second Alphonse 
in my son’s son ; but now that hope is also destroyed. 
Yet I am very grateful for the son still spared to me; and 
I am far more happy on account of his tenderness of 
heart and conduct toward me than because of what the 
world calls his fame. He knows how to love and treat 
me well, and that is all I care for. Oh that he may also 
love the things which I love, especially that faith which 
gives me so much peace here below, and which proves to 
k 19 


218 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

me that the only true immortality is to be attained in and 
for the future ! To me it is a great joy to have him and 
his wife near me this winter; and the idea of our approach¬ 
ing separation is already beginning to afflict me. It seems 
to be his lot to live out of France ; and I must always love 
him for himself, and not for my own sake. 

“The last moments of Bonaparte at Saint Helena 
have recently occupied my mind very seriously, and sug¬ 
gested many reflections on the perfect ways of God, and 
the folly and worthlessness of mere worldly glory. The 
recent death of Lord Byron, the great English poet, has 
also even more profoundly impressed me. Truly God is 
great! Yet it is only required of us that we shall love 
Him, fear Him, and keep His commandments. I went 
immediately to announce this last death to my son, my¬ 
self moved and trembling as if it were to me a personal 
misfortune. Can it be possible, or is it at all probable, 
that, at some future day, another mother will tremble and 
weep while announcing to her son the death of mine? 
May that sad event happen at the hour and according to 
the great mercy of our God! Little concerned am I 
about Alphonse’s renown. It is his eternal salvation for 
which I constantly and fervently pray. 

“Alphonse is now writing a poem entitled ‘ Childe 
Harold,’ in which he celebrates the heroic death of Lord 
Byron in the cause of Greek independence. There are some 
passages in this poem which trouble me very much; for I 
perceive in them a dangerous enthusiasm for the modern 
ideas in philosophy and politics, quite contrary to the 
principles of both religion and monarchy,—those two 
landmarks of my pathway which ought to be his also. 
On either side of that pathway I see only fogs and pit- 
falls, and especially the fatal, bottomless precipices of 
incredulity. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


219 


“ I knew, in my youth, several of the famous philoso¬ 
phers whose teachings are now attracting the attention of 
many free-thinkers and dreamers. Grant, O my God, 
that Alphonse may not be like them ! I have frequently 
represented to him very strongly the danger of these new 
and startling ideas; but the wind bloweth where it list- 
eth, as saith the sacred book. When a mother has once 
brought into the world a son, and inculcated in him her 
own faith, what more can she do but interpose, as best 
she may, her feeble hand between the torch of that faith 
and the storms of secular sentiment which threaten to 
extinguish it? Indeed, I am often very proud of my son; 
but I am well punished on account of his independence 
of mind. 

“As for myself, to believe and obey seems to be the 
only wisdom suitable to my condition. This is said to 
be less poetic; but I find quite as much poetry in sub¬ 
mission of mind as in rebellion of spirit. Are the ever 
faithful angels less poetic and happy than the fallen angels 
who rose up against God ? I would much prefer that my 
child should have none of the vain talents of this world, 
rather than that, having them, he should turn against 
those precious doctrines in which I myself have found so 
much strength and light and consolation.” 

cxxiv. 

" February 20, 1825. 

“Alphonse and his wife and Sophie and I are all living 
the same retired life, under the same roof, reading to¬ 
gether and mourning over our late misfortunes. Sophie’s 
education gives me very little trouble, for she seems to 
have been born already instructed and entirely pious. In 
the evening, my husband, myself, and our children being 
all gathered around the fireside, we read such good books 


220 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


as will best nourish our minds and souls. My husband 
seems to love now more than ever before this life of 
almost perfect seclusion, in which books, and the conver¬ 
sational criticisms which they provoke, are almost the 
only events. There comes to men a time when they love 
to retire from the scenes of action, great or small, which 
they themselves have occupied, and when their greatest 
apparent pleasure is to become seated and passive, if not 
indifferent, spectators to the things of the world. Books 
then afford them their principal entertainment. In his¬ 
tory they see the real world passing in review under their 
very eyes; and in romances they perceive the grotesque 
and comical features of the imaginary world. Good 
books are the faithful reflectors of the lives of excellent 
persons who have ceased to live in themselves, but who, 
nevertheless, live over again in the lives of others.” 

cxxv. 

“Sunday, June 26, 1825. 

“ What a long interval has passed without my having 
written a single line in this book ! It is because I have 
been suffering very much from a severe spell of sickness, 
so severe that I doubted seriously whether I should ever 
recover my health. It seemed to me that I saw death 
itself staring me in the face; and I confess that I was 
frightened, for I did not feel prepared. . . . Are we ever 
sufficiently prepared for death ? I prayed to Heaven for 
a prolongation ot my life, so that I might have time to 
prepare and purify myself more acceptably. God has 
graciously granted me my prayer in this regard; but in 
the very midst of my convalescence He has again chas¬ 
tised me with a great sorrow. By the merest chance I 
was told of it without any preparation whatever. Al¬ 
phonse, in a little poem on the coronation of the king, 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


221 


has not written one word about the Duke of Orleans, 
whom he does not like,—sharing in this respect the 
prejudices of his father and all the other Lamartines. 
He finds something equivocal, and scarcely excusable, in 
the conduct of a prince of the royal family, whose father 
had the misfortune to condemn to death his own relative 
and king, Louis XVI., who, however, was afterward par¬ 
doned, welcomed, and overwhelmed with wealth and 
honors by the elder branch of the Bourbons; and who 
then, instead of manifesting a proper devotion to his ben¬ 
efactors, unshaken, as they were, by the severest tests, 
coolly made friends with all their enemies, and tried to 
gain popularity at their expense. Alphonse never speaks 
except with a certain sharply-defined bitterness of what 
he calls this disloyal conduct on the part of the duke’s 
father; and it is this that sorely troubles me, for I re¬ 
gard the duke himself as an eminently honest and good 
man, and quite incapable of participating in the crime 
of his unhappy parent. I must confess,' however, that it 
would be becoming in this prince to be more reserved 
in his intercourse with those who are opposed to him, 
and not to surround himself with all those discontented 
and ambitious spirits, revolutionists and Bonapartists, 
who make up so heterogeneously what is called his party. 
But courtesy and charity require us to suppose that his 
intentions are good; and we ought not to accuse him 
rashly. 

“ When Alphonse read to me the verses of his poem* 
in which he celebrates the deeds of most of the warriors 
and princes of the royal family, yet without saying a sin¬ 
gle word about the Duke of Orleans, I was very much 
grieved, even to tears. I besought him not to pass over 
in silence, and in this apparently studied manner, a prince 
in whose house I myself had been brought up, and whose 

19* 


222 


MY MO THER K S MANUSCRIPT. 


mother and sister had overwhelmed all my family with 
kindness. He resisted a long time with much pertinacity, 
declaring that he himself owed to the Duke of Orleans 
nothing but silence; that to the Kings Louis XVIII. and 
Charles X. he owed the honor of having served them both 
in the army and in diplomatic positions ; and that he had 
inherited from his father a sincere regard and liking for 
those unhappy princes, and a very decided aversion to 
their enemies. 

“ However, I finally obtained his consent, or rather I 
wrung from him by force of tears, and by adjuring him 
in the name of my authority as his mother, that he would 
mention with becoming terms of respect the name of the 
Duke of Orleans in this poem of homage to the Bour¬ 
bons. He did it to please me, but was, it seems, both 
unhappy and unfortunate in the expression of a sentiment 
which he himself did not feel. 

*‘ These verses, which alluded to the 21st of January, 
and to the beheading of Louis XVI., were regarded as 
an insult to and by the Duke of Orleans. I do not know 
exactly how it happened, but it would seem that, in some 
way or other, the prince heard of it through the book¬ 
seller, even before the poem was published, and caused a 
letter to be written to my son by our relative, Monsieur 
Henrion de Pansey, who was president of his Council. 
Monsieur de Pansey, in the name of the prince, asked 
Alphonse, in suitable terms, to suppress the objectionable 
passage. My son immediately replied, in very respectful 
terms also, that he had not intended to wound the feel¬ 
ings of a prince whose family had been so kind to his 
mother’s family, and that he would hasten to write to his 
printer to suppress the lines which, contrary to the inten¬ 
tion of the writer, seemed to be offensive to the Duke of 
Orleans. He did, in fact, write by the same courier to 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


223 


his publisher, instructing him not to print the passage in 
question. 

“ Everything, therefore, seemed to be satisfactorily set¬ 
tled in this way, when the Duke of Orleans, not knowing 
that Alphonse had acceded to his request, and more im¬ 
patient than polite to have the passage suppressed, caused 
another letter to be written, in which he threatened to 
use his influence against him at court, and warned him 
to beware, as a first prince of the blood never lacked the 
means of retaliating an injury on a young man who would 
persist in offending him so gravely. When he received 
this letter, my son could not restrain his natural pride 
thus abruptly aroused. He declared that he would not, 
under any consideration, yield to a threat what he had 
already yielded to a request; and so, by courier after 
courier, he wrote to his publisher to let the passage stand, 
and to print it just as it was at first written. 

“ Nevertheless, in order not to offend unnecessarily the 
Duke of Orleans, he wrote to him the same day, stating 
that the duke’s letter of intimidation having been already 
noised abroad by the newspapers, which could not have 
known of it except through some indiscretion at the Royal 
Palace, and that as the suppression of the particular pas¬ 
sage referred to by the several newspapers issued in the 
interest of the duke could not now be attributed to any¬ 
thing less than a sort of cowardice, which would be a dis¬ 
grace to the character of the writer, he felt constrained 
to let it stand precisely as he first wrote it, and hoped the 
duke himself would appreciate this supreme necessity of 
honor, and not attribute it to any deliberate purpose of 
offending him. It is only just to add that the duke re¬ 
plied immediately, saying that he recognized this super¬ 
lative necessity of honor in the new situation in which 
my son was placed, by the premature publicity given to 


224 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


the affair in the newspapers of the party of liberal opinions. 
Everything was thus explained on both sides, and the 
passage appeared. 

“ All this was to me the cause of a very great heartache, 
greater indeed than I ever dared to tell either my husband 
or my son. In my infancy I had been overwhelmed with 
kindness by this august family, and had learned from my 
mother to sincerely respect and cherish its name. In cir¬ 
cumstances of profound sorrow for my mother, and for 
other members of my family, I had had recourse to the 
affection of the Princess of Orleans, whose heart I always 
found full of generous sympathy for me. My son and 
husband were ignorant of many of these intimate rela¬ 
tions ; and it was not perfectly convenient for me to let 
them know of them. Judge, then, of my perplexity and 
affliction in considering that this excellent princess might 
wrongfully but naturally attribute to my own ingratitude 
or forgetfulness an offense to her family, committed by the 
head and hand of my son ! 

“After spending several nights in tears, I wrote to the 
princess to undeceive her, and to express to her all my 
pain on account of her own good self. She replied, 
rather as a friend than as a princess, saying that she well 
understood both my position and my grief. Thanks to 
God, all has terminated well; and my only fear now is 
that the incident may leave a secret coolness and soreness 
between the prince and Alphonse, and be the cause of 
putting still greater distance between my son and that 
family to which, more than to any other in France, he 
should look for protection and promotion. But the pre¬ 
judices of the royalist noblemen in the provinces against 
the name of Orleans are unjust and extreme, and seem 
to flow with the blood from father to son. I repeat it 
again, it has been to me a great sorrow, which I have felt 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


225 


all the more keenly because I could not confide it to any 
one. The proud susceptibility of my husband could not 
have understood my correspondence with the Princess of 
Orleans, nor the many delicate attentions and favors which 
my family received from hers on various occasions. 

“ Alphonse is about to go far away again, and for a 
long time, in diplomacy. He thinks he will be sent to 
Germany. I cannot help weeping when I think of it. 
How rapidly my house is becoming empty ! Only a few 
years ago it was full of cheerful life and noise and com¬ 
motion. Now it reminds me of those large and tenant¬ 
less nests which I see, in the autumn, on the tops of the 
elm-trees in the court-yard of Saint Point; instead of eggs 
and little birds, there is no longer anything in them but 
dust and snow, and the winds are carrying them away 
twig by twig. Even in our best estate here on earth, 
what are we?” 

cxxvi. 

September 18, 1825. 

“At last my children have started from Saint Point 
on their long journey. How lonely I feel! They are 
going to live in Italy,—God alone knows for how long a 
time! It is now my intention to return to the city, as 
my husband, since he does not hunt any more, prefers to 
live there. I myself am very sorry to go, for I am as 
well off here as I can be anywhere in my sorrows. I am 
now passing many of my mornings with Nicole, whose 
* Moral Essays’ strike my mind with great force. In the 
evenings I read the works of Madame de Sevigne, who is 
my favorite author in the style of conversation. Much 
of my time is also taken up with thoughts of the absent 
and the dead. Alas, how many there are of these ! 

“ Yesterday I received a visit from that excellent, amia¬ 
ble, and resigned Monsieur . . ., who desired so much 

K* 


226 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


to marry my dear Cesarine. He did not speak on the 
subject at all; but the fact alone of his presence, and his 
tenderness of manner toward me, spoke more significantly 
than any words which he could have used. After he went 
away I wept much. All those whom I see, and who have 
loved my daughters, are to me so many souvenirs. I shall 
probably weep tears of sorrow all the rest of my life. 
Nevertheless, I am absolutely certain of yet finding and 
embracing again my lost children. What a great happi¬ 
ness it is to have a faith like mine ! If religion did no¬ 
thing else but give us this faith in the return and renewal 
of the sweetest portion of the past, we would still have 
superabundant reasons to praise God for it; and who of 
us all has not at least one bright hope, strengthened by a 
happy confidence, indissolubly connecting the future with 
the past?” 

cxxvn. 

“ Milly, October 24 , 1825. 

“I am here alone, first to put everything in order, and 
then to close up the house. My husband and all the 
others have already gone to the city. I have been to 
Saint Point, having ridden there on an ass, accompanied 
by the gardener, in order to arrange the books and orange- 
trees and pots of flowers which Marianne, my daughter- 
in-law, earnestly recommended to my care when she left 
for Italy. I remained at Saint Point for some time, on 
account of the rain, well cared for, however, in the dear 
old deserted mansion, by that wonderful saint on earth, 
Marie Litaud, who ably and honestly manages the house¬ 
hold affairs in the absence of her masters. I have made 
this poor girl very happy indeed, by placing her with my 
son. Near by was the church, so dear to me by the 
recollection of all the prayers which I used to offer up 
there with my sweet little ones, now saints in heaven. 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


227 


I was happily surrounded with books, and with a fullness 
of the other comforts of a country home; too much so, 
perhaps. There I took great pleasure in silence and soli¬ 
tude, seated in the parlor, at a corner of a large fire-place 
where I tried to call back my scattered thoughts and fix 
them once more in proper meditation on eternal things 
before plunging again into the bustle and noise of this 
vain world. 

“ I have received good news from Florence, where my 
son and his wife are now established. They have done 
well in arranging their affairs here; for it is but right and 
prudent for them to have some certain spot to look for¬ 
ward to, as a place of repose for their thoughts as well as 
for their effects. In the newspaper for which Madame de 
Genlis writes, an article has appeared this week sharply 
criticising the poetry of my son. It is only one of the 
wordy and bloodless sorties of an hereditary family war. 
Madame de Genlis and my mother used to lead two op¬ 
posing camps in the Royal Palace. Yet I am very sensi¬ 
tive to these stabs at the reputation of my son; and it 
was my desire that the article should be answered. That 
was the prompting of a mother’s vanity; but it is doubt¬ 
less better to accept these humiliations without resentment. 
What is the good of charity if it does not prevent us 
from retaliating such superficial pin-scratches as these? 

“ Why is it that we all desire absolute superiority in 
everything, both for ourselves and for our children ? If 
we have any important advantages by inheritance or other¬ 
wise, we should use them with thankfulness and modesty; 
if we have them not, we should refrain from envying 
those who do possess them. The gifts of God are favors, 
and not merits. I shall endeavor to accustom myself to 
bear with becoming resignation these slanderous attacks 
on my son, which so often appear in the columns of cer- 


228 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

tain sensational newspapers, especially those of Orleanist 
or Bonapartist proclivities. I have bestowed on Alphonse, 
and have centered in him, too much self-esteem, which is, 
I fear, only my own vanity disguised; but I must pardon 
myself, notwithstanding; for I am his mother, and can¬ 
not help feeling as I do, no matter how hard I may try 
to the contrary.” 

cxxvm. 

“ February i, 1826. 

“ I do not write any more now, except in the way of 
jotting down very brief notes. In my position as Presi¬ 
dent of the Bureau of Charity, the care of the poor of the 
city takes up nearly all my time; and indeed I have to 
overtax myself frequently in more than one way to make 
a proper distribution of food and clothing to the many 
helpless sufferers during this rigorous winter. I am ably 
assisted, however, by an accomplished young married 
lady, Madame de Villeneuve, whose husband is now Pre¬ 
fect of the Department. She is almost like a daughter to 
me. It seems somewhat strange that young married 
ladies should show me so much friendly attention. Per¬ 
haps it is in return for my sincere sympathy for them, 
which in my heart so soon ripens into affection, through 
my long habit of loving my own daughters, of whom 
these young ladies remind me. Madame de Villeneuve 
has drawn for me some beautiful screen-pictures, each one 
presenting a view of the different houses once occupied 
by Madame de Sevigne, who is, so to speak, one of the 
maternal ancestors of my mind and heart. Madame 
de Villeneuve pleasantly suggested that these souvenirs 
would serve as illustrations of the works of this charming 
author, which she always sees either on my knees or on 
the mantel-piece. What excellent society we can always 
find among our favorite authors ! Though they be long 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


229 


dead, yet we can live delightfully with them in reading 
their great and happy thoughts.” 

cxxix. 

“ April 27, 1826. 

“The Abbot of Lamartine is dead. For a long time 
past his life has been little else than an almost daily ex¬ 
pectation of this event. I hope and believe God will be 
good to him who was so good to others. In spite of his 
preferences, he was impelled into an ecclesiastical career, 
which was entirely unsuited to him. He lived like a 
hermit on his fine estate at Montculot, which he has be¬ 
queathed to Alphonse, subject to an annual allowance to 
my husband and a certain sum to be given at once to 
each one of his five sisters. We have written Alphonse 
to request leave of absence to come home, so that he 
may arrange matters properly, and take possession of this 
fine residence with its beautiful forests.” 


cxxx. 

" May 24, 1826. 

“I have suffered a great deal during the last few days, 
on account of a terrible affair affecting Alphonse, occa¬ 
sioned by a passage in his poem of 1 Childe Harold,’ 
relating to Italy. He has been dangerously wounded in 
a duel with Colonel Pepe. I have trembled, and am 
still trembling so much for his soul as well as for his life, 
that I do not feel able to write any more about it here 
just now. If he has been guilty in the sight of God, he 
has surely repented of his sin, or must do so, or be lost 
forever! O my God, I beseech Thee to reclaim my son, 
and to lead him henceforth in the paths of peace and 
righteousness! 

“ They write me now that he has recovered, and that 
20 


230 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


everything has been amicably arranged. He is writing 
now, during his hours of leisure, a series of profoundly 
religious poems called * Harmonies.’ Several fragments 
which he has sent me are entirely after my own heart. 
Ah, this is the use which I have always desired he should 
make of a talent which is truly divine only as it soars up 
again to the great God who gave it!” 

cxxxi. 

“ Milly, July 22,1826. 

“I have now spent three days at Milly, and have not 
yet felt the slightest desire to be elsewhere. I would like 
it if I could dwell here all the time with my husband and 
Sophie. It is sad for us all to be thus separated from 
each other. I am beginning now to feel very sensibly 
the feebleness of advancing age, and miss more and more 
that activity of body and mind which used to afford me 
so much pleasure, even in solitude. 

“My sixty years, now but little short of completion, 
begin to weigh heavily upon me. I can scarcely believe 
that I am so old; but the record of each year tells against 
me, and it must be true. It does not make me particularly 
sorrowful to think of this; only I do hope and pray that 
God may be pleased to grant me grace to employ the little 
remnant of my days and faculties in a manner pleasing to 
Him, and enable me to give my whole thought to prepa¬ 
ration for that marvelous eternity which is so rapidly ad¬ 
vancing to meet me. And yet my mind is still easily 
diverted to other objects, and, at times, is even prone to 
be occupied with earthly considerations. For example, I 
have, perhaps, looked with too much interest at the real 
beauty and prospective value of our vineyards. There 
has been a dreadful drought which has damaged them 
considerably; but now they have regained their verdure 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


231 


and luxuriance, and are simply superb. Our whole in¬ 
come, as we expect it for the next year, is thus suspended 
in the material of these myriads of little grapes, pendent 
from their vines. . . . Truly, man himself is much like 
an insect, which lives upon a leaf, and which dies when 
the leaf itself decays. O God, protect, I beseech Thee, 
our own green leaves, and especially the fruit-nursing 
leaves of our poor laborers! 

“ Alphonse is now intrusted with the diplomatic affairs 
of France in Tuscany, at Lucca, and at Parma; and now 
that all the French embassadors are absent from every 
one of the Italian States except Rome, they have added 
twenty thousand francs to his salary. The king and his 
ministers are all very much pleased with him, and he with 
his position. His only fault is in representing his country 
with a little too much liberality and extravagance; but 
Providence will take care of him. No longer have I any 
need to worry myself about him. By his tender devotion, 
and his anxious cares for all my little affairs, he pays me 
back, with double measure, for all the pains and sacrifices 
he cost me during the restless period of his youth. I 
should now be a happy mother if I had not lost the two 
flowers of my crown. Oh, what an empty and dismal 
space their disappearance makes in my garden, as I walk 
there in the twilight, seeking them with roving eye and 
with listening ear! Whether I wish to do it or not, I 
must separate myself more and more from this world. 
The night approaches. How much longer am I to remain 
amid the miserable scenes of earth? God knows well 
the time; and I leave myself entirely in His hands, with¬ 
out caring to count the days, only imploring permission 
to remain long enough to merit from His bounty a more 
permanent felicity. 

“I have just undertaken a heavy piece of worsted-work, 


232 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


which will, perhaps, last as long as my life. It is a rug 
for Alphonse’s chamber at Saint Point. As the feet of 
himself and family shall press its meshes, after I shall have 
passed away, they may think, and will think rightly, that 
each stitch was a thought for him and for them. Alas, 
this frail texture will probably exist at least one hundred 
years after they and I shall be no more. ... I feel sad.” 

cxxxn. 

" Tuesday, December 3, 1826. 

“ We are now considering a certain proposition for the 
marriage of my Sophie. As soon as she shall be happily 
married, then, in truth, will my work on earth be done. 
Then will I be able to say, with Simeon of old, ‘ Now, 
Lord, let Thy servant depart in peace.’ The gentleman 
who has made the proposition is Monsieur de Ligonne, 
from Mende, in the mountains of Cevennes. He is 
said to be much respected for his fine mind and agreeable 
manners. His property, though not of great value, is yet 
large enough for an ordinary family. The habits of life 
in the country where he lives are not luxurious; and 
Sophie, on her own part, is both reason and piety per¬ 
sonified.” 

cxxxm. 

" May 5, 1827. 

“My eldest brother-in-law, Monsieur de Lamartine, 
the head of the family, died on Sunday last, at eleven 
o’clock in the morning. He was nearly eighty years of 
age. He preserved, to the very end of his earthly exist¬ 
ence, his vigor of mind. His sister and I were both 
present. She and I received his last farewell and his last 
sigh. He has died much regretted throughout the whole 
of his section of the country. He was a man of a very 
cultivated mind. His knowledge was almost universal in 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


233 


its scope; and his conversation was always wonderfully 
varied and interesting. During the whole period of his 
life, both in the family and in the world about here, he 
reigned almost like a king. In early life he had been an 
officer in the light dragoons, under Louis XV.; but his 
delicate health soon called him back to Macon, where he 
took charge of the large and embarrassed estates of my 
father-in-law, situated in Doubs and Burgundy. He was 
generally listened to as if he were an oracle; and he was 
worthy of all the attention he received. He was associ¬ 
ated, in one way or another, with all the eminent men of 
the Constituent Assembly, and with the principal leaders 
in science and literature, such as Buffon, Mirabeau, and 
the great economists. 

“The deceased head of the Lamartines lived at home 
in good style, with his sisters, who were unmarried, like 
himself. He has left his undivided estate at Saint Pierre 
to Alphonse and to his niece Cecilia (Madame de Cessia), 
and his estate at Monceau to his sister, Mademoiselle de 
.Lamartine, who will bequeath it to Alphonse before she 
dies. Nothing important was ever decided or done in the 
family except by him or in substantial accordance with 
his ideas and wishes. This inflexible autocracy on his 
part has often thwarted my projects, and occasioned very 
painful annoyances, sometimes in regard to the marriage 
of my daughters, and at other times in regard to my 
son and his education; but, after all, I may have been 
wrong, and he right, since everything has turned out so 
well. 

“Mademoiselle de Lamartine, the sister of the de¬ 
ceased, is also left very rich; but in reality she is one of 
the poor in spirit, for she absolutely denies herself every 
indulgence of luxury in order to be able to give as much as 
possible to the poor and unfortunate. She is a real saint 

20* 


234 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


upon earth. I have never before known a person so little 
bound to the things of this world. There is nothing in 
her holy manner of life which is in the least intolerant or 
austere toward others; nor does she ever say or do any¬ 
thing which would have a tendency to wound their feel¬ 
ings in the slightest degree. When once outside of the 
church, or her own chapel, where she spends most of her 
time, her piety turns immediately and entirely to prac¬ 
tical gentleness and goodness. The smiles of the blessed 
are always upon her lips, and visions of heaven in the ex¬ 
pression of her eyes. Her greatest misfortune is one of 
over-scrupulousness in exactions against herself. She does 
not trust sufficiently in the boundless mercy and benevo¬ 
lence of God. Yet she is, in truth, the angel of the 
household, and a blessing to the whole city. 

“ The preliminaries of the marriage of my daughter 
Sophie are all arranged. Our neighbors, Monsieur de 
Morangie and his wife, who are also our relatives, have 
formally brought to us the young gentleman, presented 
him, and asked for him our daughter’s hand. I am really 
charmed by his modest and thoughtful appearance, by his 
exquisite air of refinement, and by the wonderful evidences 
of delicacy and perfection observable in everything he 
does. I think he is one of those rare men who, at first 
sight, impress us with a conviction of the probable happi¬ 
ness in store for their intended wives; but, alas, he will take 
my Sophie so far away from me; and they will spend with 
us only six months of the year! What will become of me 
without that dear child, who has so long and so affec¬ 
tionately nestled around me as if she were the sprightly 
shadow of all the others ? She is as candid and guileless 
as a child of only eight years, and yet as mature in judg¬ 
ment as a woman of sixty. By my own election she was 
my confidante and adviser in almost every important 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


2 35 


matter; and I think it probable that our constant inter¬ 
course, which was so free and full that we lost sight of the 
difference in our respective ages, contributed in no small 
degree to the development of her judgment in advance 
of her years. In piety she is already an angel; and if 
it were possible for one to be too pious, I should have 
doubts about her on that account. She is quite motherly 
in her ideas and ways, even before she has any family 
whatever; and her children, if it please God to give her 
any, will, I dare predict, be very happy. 

“1 shall accompany my daughter as far as Mende, but 
will stay there with her only a few days. It is not proper 
that I should now leave my husband alone for any con¬ 
siderable length of time. He suffers somewhat from his 
infirmities, but still more from restlessness and weariness 
when I am away. M 

cxxxiv. 

" January 13, 1828. 

“ How much more shall I write in this book of the 
years 1800 and odd? God alone knows; I leave myself 
entirely to Him. What now grieves me most is that I 
am still so much attached to the earth by a long series of 
passionate cravings. Nevertheless, I often feel comforted 
in the belief that my heart is truly devoted to God; and 
I pray and beseech Him to have mercy on me and my 
family. The present condition of France causes me 
great fear; for the journals of the day are kindling the 
flames of excitement not only in the minds but also in 
the hearts of the people. We have had a most noisy and 
feverish contest here over the recent election between 
Monsieur de Rambuteau and Monsieur Doria, the rival 
candidates. God must be grievously offended by these 
bitter contentions, wherein they mutually defame and 
traduce each other’s characters. Monsieur de Villele has 


236 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


been dismissed from the Ministry. Many of our public 
men seem to be enraged against religion, which is my 
chief care in politics. I do not like in the least this 
eternal war of invectives between the partisan journals. 
How could men ever conceive and put in practice the 
idea of this unlimited liberty of the press, which is said 
to be a necessity under constitutional government? I 
am afraid this government, from which we have expected 
so many good things, will bring us only storms and strife, 
even in private families. It is oftener the spirit of men 
than the spirit of God which inspires these wrangling 
newspapers. O Heaven, is there, then, nothing but dis¬ 
simulation and vanity in all systems of human govern¬ 
ment? 

“ Monsieur de la Maisonforte, our Minister at Florence, 
died at Lyons, while on his return to Tuscany. Monsieur 
de Vitrolles has been appointed in his place, but it will 
be a long time yet before he will go to his post, and, 
judging from the general aspect of things now, Alphonse 
will probably be retained indefinitely in Italy. Sophie, 
who is all the society and all the consolation I have this 
winter, is nearly ready to start again for Mende. My 
poor husband suffers severely and constantly from his 
chronic and painful infirmity, and I am now devoting 
myself entirely to his comfort. I try to make him forget 
time, and would like to forget it myself, until my son 
comes back from Italy. They are discussing the question 
of appointing him Minister of France to a distant foreign 
country. What would become of me if a new appoint¬ 
ment (even though it might be higher and better for him¬ 
self) should exile him in some far-off region for a long 
term of years? How sorrowful, indeed, may yet be the 
close of my days, after a long life of anxiety ! Where, in 
all this world, can I find refuge except in prayer ? This 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


237 


it is, and this only, which always calms me, as if I were 
holding converse with an old, well-tried, and all-power¬ 
ful friend. Oh, what a great happiness it is to be able 
to believe even in the possibility of this living and sensi¬ 
ble communion of a creature with its Creator!” 

cxxxv. 

" April 15, 1828. 

“ Here I am again, this morning, at Milly, but only 
for a few minutes. It is here, more than at any other 
place, that I always feel a desire to write certain things in 
this neglected journal, so soon, perhaps, to be entirely 
and forever abandoned. For reasons of age and feeble¬ 
ness, and for other reasons, I do not now take the same 
interest as formerly in either reading or writing. The 
events which now interest me most are occurring far 
away; and time and circumstances and all mundane 
things seem to me to be passing very rapidly. As we 
increase in years, after having already grown old, we 
realize so perfectly the emptiness and vanity of every¬ 
thing, that we are far less earnest in preserving or record¬ 
ing our passing impressions. Nevertheless, there are cer¬ 
tain periods and facts which I desire to notice, from time 
to time, not so much for myself as for the benefit of my 
children. My last steps are those which, as I trust, will 
lead me to heaven; and I must not wholly neglect to 
mention them. I am well aware of the present actual 
existence of my old-womanhood, though others pretend 
not to notice it at all, telling me, with pleasant smiles, 
that I look to be only about thirty years of age! But, 
as Virgil says, in a passage which I was reading, this 
evening, in Boisgermain’s translation, I see the shadows 
are lengthening behind me.” 


238 


MYJMOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


CXXXVI. 

“ September 15, 1828. 

“At length Alphonse has come, having arrived here 
on Wednesday, the 10th of this month, with his wife, his 
mother-in-law, and his charming little daughter; all in 
excellent health. Thanks, a thousand thanks, unto our 
God ! Alphonse, however, is very thin, which troubles 
me. But I will soon become accustomed to that. I have 
been very happy, much excited, and busily occupied ever 
since they came; and, at my age, any great agitation, 
whether caused by pleasure or by pain, is rather difficult 
to support. Therefore my own health is not quite so 
good as usual. Recovery, however, is generally easy 
and certain when the heart is content. Contentedness of 
heart, though, is a rather rare thing in this world, and 
mine is far from being in a perfectly happy condition. 
There are many things, real or imaginary, which trouble 
me. 

“ Nowhere in the world is it possible to see anything 
prettier and more amiable in everything, considering her 
age, than little Julia. She is a real treasure, and, thus 
far, has been wonderfully well brought up. Her mother 
is more perfect than ever, fulfilling all her duties with 
simple piety, and without any mixture whatever of affecta¬ 
tion. She has also made progress in many of the higher 
accomplishments of the age, and now paints beautifully. 
As specimens of her own artistic skill she has brought us 
several charming pictures, among others two very fine 
portraits of Julia.” 

CXXXVII. 

" MlLLY, October 3, 1828. 

“ I have been here, entirely alone, since Monday, the 
22d of September, having come to superintend our vint- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


239 


age. Alphonse and Marianne, with her mother and Julia, 
left Macon on Wednesday, the 17th ultimo, to go to Mont- 
culot, where they were all received as the barons used to 
be in olden times. The good people came out to meet 
them on the road, the women and children dressed in 
white, and the men playing instruments of music and 
firing guns. They returned their kindness by a brilliant 
entertainment in the gardens and groves of the castle, 
which extend away until they are lost in the surrounding 
woods. 

“ From Montculot Alphonse went alone to Paris, where 
his friends called him to let him know, in confidence, that 
there was talk and danger of a new revolution, concocted 
by one of the discontented and over-ambitious Bourbons. 
Alphonse assures me that, as he thinks, the plot will fail, 
but that if the Bourbons, whom he loves as well as I do, 
do venture to take this step, they will sink under the 
weight of public opinion. Perhaps he is right. From an 
outside view one can sometimes judge better of what is 
taking place in his own country than he can from a view 
within. As for myself, I am both sick and dismayed at 
the prevalence of these political fevers increasing every 
morning, which the journals of the two parties are only 
aggravating, and into which many of even the wisest and 
the best are thrown, in spite of their cooler judgments. 
Sometimes I am filled with fear that everything may soon 
be wrecked and ruined under a government thus subject 
to such chaotic turmoils of opinion.” 

CXXXVIII. 

" November 7, 1828. 

“ Alphonse has just arrived. He was very well received 
at Paris, especially by the king, Charles X. He would 
have been sent immediately to Spain, as First Secretary of 


240 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Legation, if he had accepted the proffered position; but 
he preferred to wait for the London mission, which they 
promised to give him within a year, and from which, in 
due time, the Secretary is almost always promoted to the 
very high and honorable office of Minister Plenipoten¬ 
tiary. He has brought me a beautiful chandelier for my 
parlor at Macon, and also a large sum of money, of which, 
as he rightly guessed, I was in great need for the general 
expenses of housekeeping. The receipt of this money 
will save me from the necessity of afflicting my poor hus¬ 
band, who might have been annoyed and vexed if I had 
had to call on him for it. How happy, how very happy, 
I am at this reunion ! My children will pass the winter 
with us at Macbn. They are now at Saint Point. Al¬ 
phonse has sent me some poetry which he has just com¬ 
posed at that place, and which has deeply moved me. . In 
these verses he has expressed very exactly many of my 
own thoughts. Verily, he is my very voice, the proclaimer 
of my own sentiments; for I too have a keen sense and 
profound appreciation of both the true and the beauti¬ 
ful ; but, unfortunately, I become almost dumb whenever I 
desire to express them, even to God. At all times, when 
I meditate, I have in my heart a sort of great glowing fur¬ 
nace ; but the flames do not come out. However, God, 
who graciously listens to me, has no need of my words. 
I thank Him for having given them to my son.” 

Here follows a hymn of gratitude and blessing to this 
same son. 

cxxxix. 

“July 13, 1829. 

“ Under this date, and in this wide gap, I jot down 
some of the particulars of my recent journey to Paris. 
Thanks to my worthy son, it was one long-continued in¬ 
toxication of pleasure. It was a real happiness to me to 


AIY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


241 


be able to see once again that splendid city of my child¬ 
hood, and to make there the acquaintance of the many 
friends of fame whom Alphonse now has among those 
most highly distinguished by birth and by talents. Ma¬ 
dame Recamier, whom they are so complimentary as to 
say I resemble, welcomed me with exquisite grace and 
cordiality. I was present at her house to hear there a 
reading by Monsieur de Chateaubriand. He read his own 
tragedy of Moses; but his face and general appearance 
impressed me more than his poetry. He has the majestifc 
bearing of a king surrounded by his court. I like much 
better the natural and modest mien of many other men, 
of great name and fame, who were there, or whom I saw 
in my youth. After all, glory, even worldly glory, does 
have a great charm for me. I used to think that if my 
son should ever become possessed of the least little share 
of it I would be only too proud; but now I ask of God, 
for him, many other things before that.” 

CXL. 

“ September 21, 1829. 

“ My good Alphonse overwhelms me with affection. 
Like all my other children, he is a child of my heart. It 
is always he who now comes to my aid in my days of 
difficulty and distress. He has just engaged to pay for us 
three thousand francs which we owe for rent to my sister- 
in-law, Madame de Villars. It is the second time he h&s 
done us this great favor. I chronicle here all these in¬ 
stances of his perfect affection for me ; and, in the fullness 
of my heart, I renew acknowledgments of the thousands 
and thousands of blessings which I owe to God for my 
children. 

“ Alphonse is not here at present, he having gone on 
business to his estate at Montculot, near Dijon. He re- 


L 


21 


242 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


fused the post to which he was called by the new Secre¬ 
tary of State, Monsieur de Polignac, fearing to associate 
his name with an administration which is now exciting a 
great outcry of public reprobation. Monsieur de Polignac 
insisted, but my son replied that on no account whatever 
would he risk the danger of being considered an accom¬ 
plice, not even a subordinate one, in a conspiracy against 
the Charter; that, in his opinion, such a conspiracy, if 
carried out, or even if only attempted, would result in 
tfie overthrow of the Bourbons; that he knew very well 
that Monsieur de Polignac had not now any intention of 
the kind, but that the mutual hostility between the admin¬ 
istration and the country threatened to bring on this fatal 
result, in spite of his efforts to the contrary; and that he 
respectfully prayed Monsieur de Polignac to forget him. 
My son sent me a copy of his letter, which I find, un¬ 
fortunately, but too well conceived and argued. It will 
exasperate his friends in the government, and may, per¬ 
haps, bring to a speedy and final termination his diplo¬ 
matic career. I think it is, indeed, very unfavorable for 
his future prospects; but he must act according to his 
principles, cost what it may. Popular opinion is the 
conscience of politicians. The sentiments of his letter 
E*ay possibly be useful to him in days to come. 

4 ‘There is just now a vacant seat in the French Acad¬ 
emy. Many members, among others Monsieur Laine and 
Monsieur Collard, have written to my son, requesting 
and advising him to present himself as a candidate, with 
the fullest confidence, if not absolute certainty, of being 
elected this time. He has refused to do so, with a pride 
and haughtiness which I may be wrong in approving, but 
which I do approve nevertheless. They have refused 
him once, and he will not, under any circumstances, again 
solicit their suffrages. As it is prohibited to elect a can- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


243 


didate who does not make the customary calls of courtesy 
on the members, I suppose he will not be elected. My 
vanity, always ambitious for him, suffers a little, I confess; 
but let God humiliate this pride in the son, and this self¬ 
ishness in the mother, as much as He will, for He only 
knows and does all things well. I consent to Divine chas¬ 
tisement with all the superior part of my being. 

“I must, however, here write down a great gratifica¬ 
tion of this mother’s vanity, as yet so little crushed. In 
a - public session of the Academy of Macon, three weeks 
ago, there was in attendance an immense concourse of 
people, the General Council and all the notabilities of 
the city and surrounding country being present. It was 
a very imposing assemblage. A great many interesting 
papers were read, among others a chapter from the * His¬ 
tory of the Restoration,’ by Monsieur de Lacretelle, and 
a fragment of ‘A Journey through Greece,’ by Monsieur 
Quinet, a young man justly distinguished for his vast fund 
of knowledge. Alphonse was to recite some poetry, and 
his appearance was looked forward to with much impa¬ 
tience. When his turn came, they applauded in advance, 
and cried out that they wished to see him. He arose in 
a deferential and becoming manner, and began to deliver 
a brief and extemporaneous speech in prose, in order to 
gain the sympathy of his fellow-citizens and to tell them 
truly how appreciative he was of their approval. His 
exordium pleased them very much, and the applause which 
followed was, for a time, perfectly deafening. Afterward, 
he recited a poetical address to Monsieur de Bienassis, in 
which there are many beautiful and brilliant stanzas. He 
was frequently interrupted by the most unequivocal signs 
and proofs of satisfaction. Marianne and I were at first 
deeply moved, and afterward overwhelmed with congrat¬ 
ulations, and, I may add, also, with happiness and pride. 


244 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Surely, it seems to me, our pride was.excusable in this 
case. May God’s will be done at all times and in all 
things ! He sees clearly into my heart, and knows that 
what I most desire is that my son may devote his noble 
talents and abilities exclusively to the glory of Him from 
whom he received them. 

“Now let me consider briefly a few of the .character¬ 
istics of my other children. I have gdod reason to be 
proud of them all for their sterling qualities. I love to 
repeat before the Lord, in the shaded alleys of my garden 
at Milly, and near the house where my children were 
born, that verse of the Psalmist in which he says, ‘ O 
Lord, Thou hast been my Shield and my Helper from my 
youth up. Forsake me not now in the days of my old 
age ! Withdraw not from me Thy right hand, when my 
strength shall no more uphold me!’ 

“Alas, alas, I begin to reflect much on the rapid de¬ 
cline of my life. I can now reasonably look forward to 
only a short remnant of days; but when I gaze back on 
all I have passed through, it seems as if I had lived a 
very long time.” 

CXLI. 

“ Milly, October 21, 1829. 

“ To-day is the thirty-ninth anniversary of the birth 
of Alphonse, my first-born. I am quite alone here, and 
have .devoted most of the day to such reflections as will, 
I trust, nourish my soul and strengthen me against the 
day of death. How often, at different periods of my 
life, have I thus turned and returned, in this quiet walk 
of meditation, sometimes silently pouring out my heart 
in adoration, and at other times, when nobody could 
either see or hear me, clasping my hands in audible 
prayer! Alas, what would very often have become of 
me, in the midst of my tribulations, within and without, 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


245 


if the all-sustaining goodness and power of God had not 
visited me in my devotions, and suggested more holy 
and consoling thoughts than my own ! I recognize it as 
one of the very greatest blessings vouchsafed to me from 
God, that I have this taste for gathering in my wayward 
thoughts to meditate on Him. It is God Himself who 
has graciously enabled me, almost every day of my life, 
to steal away from the bustling and corroding cares with 
which I was beset, and to devote a few hours, or at least 
a few minutes, exclusively to His worship. He Himself 
loves this soul-to-soul converse with His divine Mercy; 
and it seems to me that He always lends His ear to hear 
the throbbings of a pious heart opening up its desires to 
Him. To-day I felt the truth of this more than ever 
before, and came away bathed in tears, without having 
noticed it while I was walking. It appeared to me as if 
my whole life was being lived over again, and as if all 
persons and all things were passing in review before me 
and before Him, my Creator and my Judge. Oh that He 
may be indulgent and merciful toward me in that awful 
day of judgment which is so rapidly approaching, and 
which, for me especially, is already so near! 

“I saw myself, as if it were but yesterday, a mere 
child, playing upon the picturesquely arranged and 
beautifully decorated walks and lawns of the Grand 
Park at Saint Cloud; and then a young canoness, sing¬ 
ing and praying in the chapel of the Order of Salles, 
undecided whether or not to take world-renouncing 
vows, like my companions, and so consecrate my whole 
life, in this place of retreat between time and eternity, 
to songs and praises unto the Lord of all. 

“I saw my husband, young, handsome, and in a rich 
uniform, come to visit his sister, who was also a canon¬ 
ess, now Madame de Villars, under whose care I had 

21* 


246 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

been placed, she being older and more rational in her 
ideas than myself. I perceived that he soon began to 
notice me more particularly than any one of the others, 
and took advantage of every opportunity to call on his 
sister, who, as I have already remarked, had me some¬ 
what especially in charge. I myself observed and liked 
his noble expression; his graceful and dignified bearing, 
with a mild touch of the military in it; his daring though 
respectful glance; and a certain air of lofty pride which 
seemed to govern and soften itself only for me. 

“I remembered the smothered emotions of joy in my 
heart when he induced his sister to interrogate me, in 
order to ascertain whether I would consent to his making 
a formal proposition to my family for me in marriage; 
then our first conversation in the presence of his sister; 
then the walks we took in the adjacent grounds of the 
Order, with my companions older than myself; then the 
positive proposal to my parents, their long opposition, 
and the many tears shed before God during three full 
and weary years of uncertainty, in order to gain what 
in truth seemed impossible, a very miracle, the consent 
of his own parents; and then, at last, our years of happi¬ 
ness in this little solitude at Milly, which at that time, 
indeed, was much more humble than it is to-day; my 
despair when, so soon after our marriage, he sacrificed 
everything, even myself, to go (yet frantic with grief on 
my account) to his post of perilous duty at Paris, to 
defend there, as he did on the ioth of August, the palace 
of the king; the divine protection which enabled him to 
escape, though covered with blood, from the Garden of 
the Tuileries; his flight; his return here; his imprison¬ 
ment ; my heart-piercing anxiety for his life; my fre¬ 
quent visits to the wicket-gate of his prison, where I used 
to carry our son and hold him up to be kissed through 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


247 


the grating: my running hither and thither with my 
child in my arms, all over the city, to Dijon, and to 
Lyons, and the effort to soften the hearts of the rough 
representatives of the people, whose single word was for 
me life or death; the fall of Robespierre; my husband’s 
return to Milly; the successive births of my seven chil¬ 
dren ; their education; their marriages; and the disap¬ 
pearance forever from the earth of those two particular 
angels, for whose loss the presence of all the others could 
not console me! 

“And now the sweet repose which comes after so 
many years of weary toil! Repose ? yes, repose, but 
with it also old age; for I am old, whatever any one may 
say to the contrary. These trees, which I planted; this 
ivy, which I myself sowed on the north side of the house, 
so that Alphonse, in his metrical description of Milly, 
in his * Harmonies,’ might not lie, even in poetry; these 
tufts which already cover the whole wall, from foundation 
to roof; these walls themselves, now growing dingy and 
mossy; these cedars, which used to be no higher than 
my youngest daughter, Sophie, when she was only four 
years of age, but which now permit me to pass freely 
under their branches, the lowest of which are still higher 
than my uplifted head; all these things tell me plainly 
enough that I am now old ! Besides, the graves of many 
of our old peasants, whom I knew when they were young, 
and near which I now walk when I go to church, tell 
me even more plainly and unmistakably that my abode 
here is not permanent. Ere long the eternal resting- 
place for my mortal remains will be dug elsewhere. 

“It makes me weep when I think of all the dear ones 
whom I will have to leave behind me at my departure,— 
my poor husband, the faithful companion of my younger 
years, who, though he is not becoming feeble, yet suffers, 


248 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


and who now has need of me in his suffering, as he once 
needed me, in other days, for his happiness; my children 
also, my precious children ! Alphonse, his wife, now be¬ 
come for me, by her affection and her virtuous life, a sixth 
daughter; Cecilia and her charming little ones, a third 
generation of hearts, who love, and whom we ourselves 
cannot help but love; and then those who are already 
missing, but who seem to follow me like a shadow at sun¬ 
set as I walk and meditate in my garden; my Cesarine, 
the child, the girl, the woman of marvelous beauty, buried 
now behind that far-off horizon of the Alps, whence her 
beloved and loving memory continually rises up and comes 
to me; my Suzanne, that earthly saint even while yet 
young, who wore a crown of glory on her brow, and 
whom God took away from me in order to leave properly 
impressed on my mind a true image of His angels of 
purity! 

“Yes, here I am again, alone, as I was before having 
borne my fruits, some of which have fallen to the ground, 
like those from these trees, whilst others have been carried 
far away by the great Gardener of the Gospel. Ah, what 
manifold thoughts entice and attract me to this garden, 
follow me here, and at last drive me out when they have 
filled my heart too full, and my eyes are bathed in tears! 
Verily I too have had, and have yet, my own Garden of 
Olives! 

“ Formerly this garden was my Garden of Delight, as 
says the Song of Solomon ; but now it is bare ; it has be¬ 
come a prey to the spoiler; it has been stripped of its 
chief treasures and attractions; in truth, it is for me now 
only a Garden of Olives, where I have come to keep my 
watch on the eve of eternity! Yet it is still dear to me, 
endeared even by the empty spaces which time and death 
have made in and around it. Especially dear to me is it 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


249 


when I look yonder (though I look in vain), under the 
linden-trees, to see the white dresses of my little girls, and 
when I listen to hear, perchance, as aforetime, the joyful 
exclamations of my children over a flower or an insect 
discovered in their grass-plot. What had I done for God, 
that He should give me, as my own property, this piece of 
ground and this little house, which have sometimes caused 
me shame on account of their smallness and barrenness, 
but which, nevertheless, were such a soft and comfortable 
nest for my numerous brood ? Oh, blessed, ever blessed, 
be this spot! and, after I shall have gone from it, never 
more to return in the flesh, may it still shelter, in virtue 
and happiness, both sons and daughters whose blood once 
flowed in my own veins ! 

“ But I now hear the bell of Bussiere, which sounds the 
hour of prayer. Let us leave this for that; it is better to 
pray than to write. Drying away my tears, I will repeat 
here, all alone in this walk, the prayers which my little 
daughters used to respond to in following me, but which 
now only the sleepy sparrows and the falling leaves will 
hear. No, no, no, it is not good to be thus enervated 
and softened; on the contrary, we must reserve and in¬ 
crease our forces for the many duties which yet remain 
unaccomplished; and we have certain important duties to 
perform even on our death-beds. ‘Tears,’ says an an¬ 
cient writer, ‘tears weaken the hearts of men.’ Now, 
quite as much as ever before, I have need of all the 
courage and strength of soul that I can possibly summon 
to my aid. In Heaven is my help $ may Heaven help 
me!” 

CXLII. 

After this page, there is only one small volume more, 
full of domestic details, whose interest for us has dimin¬ 
ished with the circumstances to which the notes them- 
1* 


25 ° 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


selves allude. In this concluding little volume all is 
finished by a last page, which seems to be a formal adieu 
to her manuscript, and which I here transcribe: 

“It is God’s will. Let us leave ourselves entirely to 
Him. Briefly, and in truth, all human wisdom consists 
in humbly and worshipfully resigning ourselves to His 
gracious will. I am very busy here just now, in putting 
my old journals in order; and this requires me to read 
them over and over again, which I am doing with much 
interest. I always rise from these readings with more 
profound and heartfelt gratitude for all the blessings 
which I have received from God, and with more regret 
and self-reproach for the little advancement which I have 
made in holiness, notwithstanding all my good reflections 
and resolutions, which have so rapidly come and gone, 
and gone and come, with so little profit. But there is 
yet time, always time, so long as God leaves us life, for 
us to take advantage of, in order to gain heaven. That 
is what I entreat of Him with all my heart and soul, 
while finishing these books and while humbly beseeching 
Him to shed abundantly upon me and mine all kinds of 
spiritual blessings. As for temporal blessings, I ask for 
them only as they may be necessary aids and supports in 
a regular yet sure way to heaven; but I abandon myself, 
without the least reserve, to His fatherly wisdom and pur¬ 
poses. May He bless me in my children, in my friends, 
and in all those whom I have loved and who have loved 
me. May He also bless my enemies, in so far as I may 
have been wrong in looking upon them with ill feeling 
or hatred, or in so far as they themselves may, at any 
time, have done me any unintentional injustice, or yet 
in so far as they may ever have been at fault in honestly 
misconstruing or misunderstanding my character and 
motives.” 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


2 5 x 

These, the last foregoing, are the last words which she 
wrote upon the last page of her last volume. 

CXLIII. 

Here, then, is all that is proposed to be recorded among 
the archives of earth of the soul of this eminently lovely 
and holy woman. The rest is written in the hearts of her 
children, in the traditions of the humble village where 
she resided for forty years, and in the recollections, ever 
pleasing like herself, of that truly Attic society of Macon, 
where her memory counts as many friends as there are 
survivors among her contemporaries. 

The rest of our mother’s manuscript would have little 
or no interest for the third generation of her descend¬ 
ants. It consists, for the most part, in minute details of 
her virtuous life. Those of her grandchildren who may 
be curious to examine those details may find them noted 
down in her own handwriting in the eighteen little original 
quires of paper, which I shall have the pleasure of trans¬ 
mitting to them, in a general inventory of heart-treasures. 
There they may find her under a thousand pleasing forms; 
now as the mother of a family; now as the friend of the 
poor; and now again as the sincerely pious woman, spread¬ 
ing out before God her heart-secrets, her self-torturing 
scruples of conscience, or her worldly griefs. 

Here she tells us of her zeal, or of her lukewarmness, 
in her daily devotions at church or at her bedside; there 
of her attendance on religious ceremonies, and of her 
searching examinations of conscience on the eve of those 
particular days when she wished especially to draw nearer 
to the altar with a purer heart. Elsewhere she tells us 
of her domestic management; her plans for supplying 
the numerous wants of her family; the requirements of 
her ever-hospitable board ; the wheat in her granary; the 


252 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT 


wine of her vineyards; the young vines of her nurseries; 
the products of her dairy; the eggs from her poultry- 
yard ; the prices of bread, butter, sugar, and vegetables at 
different seasons of the year; her constant and prudent 
calculations with a view of bringing the expenses of her 
frugal table within the limited privileges of only moderate 
harvests, and with a view, besides, of always saving out 
something in anticipation of the large demands so fre¬ 
quently made upon her for the poor. Further on are 
recipes carefully noted down and explained for the ordi¬ 
nary diseases of the country-people,—the whole so ar¬ 
ranged as to constitute a complete guide to domestic 
practice, suited to a rural population. This little volume 
of carefully-written prescriptions she used at all hours of 
the day, standing in the portico of her house at Milly, 
and often dispensing, in addition to the mere prescrip¬ 
tions themselves, various kinds of medicine and other 
remedial agents to the crowds who came, especially in 
the mornings, to receive them from her hands. Some¬ 
times the whole portico was filled with the infirm, the 
aged, and sick women and children, who, by her reputa¬ 
tion for skill and kindness, had been attracted from nearly 
a score of the surrounding villages, as if on a pilgrimage 
to the holy and healing presence of a living saint. 

Again, she tells of nights passed by the bedside of 
her own suffering children, or of some poor and dis¬ 
tressed person of the village, and makes technical or semi- 
technical notes of her watchings and perceptions ,over the 
wounds she had dressed, over the symptoms, the attacks, 
the abatements and returns of the fever, and expresses 
her alternating hopes and fears in various stages of the 
disease. . Sometimes she goes so far as to take from her 
bureau the linen of her beds to make, with her own nim¬ 
ble fingers, a shroud for some poor old man. She feels a 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


2 53 


positive repugnance to this dressing of wounds, and this 
attendance on the dying; but she reproaches herself for 
yielding to these defects and weaknesses of her nature, 
and overcomes them by the energy of her will and by 
the vigor of her faith. 

On leaving the scenes of these tests of charity and self- 
denial, she washes her beautiful hands, wipes away the 
tears coursing down her cheeks for the griefs of others, 
changes her ordinary service-dress for one of elegant sim¬ 
plicity, and again appears in society, her mind relaxed, 
and her heart open, with all the graceful bearing of an 
estimable and accomplished woman of the world. There 
she throws new life into the conversation, develops sym¬ 
pathy and pleasure in the hearts of others, and dissipates 
their cares with her own tranquillity, as the warm breezes 
of spring remove in their passage the dried-up leaves of 
the night before, to let the buds sprout forth as they fill 
and expand with new sap. In the radiance of her char¬ 
acter and of her works she was almost worshiped, though 
she herself was in a manner indifferent to outward appro-* 
bation. The countenances of the peasants who saw her 
pass with her daughters on their way to church, or on 
their return from visiting their own humble cottages, 
always became uncommonly respectful and affectionate, 
as if, in reality, they had had the good fortune to meet 
white-winged spirits of consolation crossing their path¬ 
way. 

Her happiness at that time was not greatly dispropor- 
tioned to her goodness. All of the more dreaded and 
difficult passes of her life were then behind her, and a 
long and serene horizon of evening, as yet undimmed by 
the darkness of night, was stretching out before her earn¬ 
est gaze. The remarkably vigorous and robust old age of 
her husband had quite overcome his painful, though not 


22 


254 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


mortal, maladies ; and it was now evident that Heaven was 
reserving for him also the days of great length hereditary 
in his family. Without any loss of mental vigor, and 
with only occasional impairments of physical health, he 
attained the age of fourscore years and ten. 

Her son, who had so long been the torment of her 
mind, was now becoming her joy. He also had passed 
the stormy period of youth ; and the storms of his middle 
age were not yet reached. Quieted down and made happy 
by a marriage which resulted from the promptings of his 
own heart; established in Italy, the particular country 
of his preferences; holding there a diplomatic position 
which enabled him to enjoy the pleasures of one of the 
most delightful abodes in all Europe; satisfied with the 
secondary but honorable rank which he held, and which 
was adorned in advance, in the eyes of his mother, with 
a certain halo of poetic glory; and without having yet 
excited the anger of the envious; he was at this time on 
leave of absence at Paris, and had just been elected, with¬ 
out any canvassing or solicitation on his own part, a mem¬ 
ber of the French Academy,—that official certificate of 
literary greatness which did not in the least deceive him¬ 
self, but which most delightfully beguiled the heart of 
his good old father. This father had been accustomed, 
in the innocence and patriotism of his provincial life, to 
consider the title of Member of the French Academy as a 
sort of indelible mark of the glory of a name, or of the 
nobility of a family; in short, as the very solidifying 
and sanctification of a well-won renown, which posterity 
would never dare to call in question. The mother of this 
recipient of the honors of the Academy enjoyed at last 
the privilege of being able to say to her husband’s whole 
family, “ You perceive now that my motherly illusions, as 
you used to call them, were, after all, not so chimerical 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


255 


as you said they were; that I was right in craving your 
patience and indulgence for a few boyish errors (or even 
vices, if you will so have it) on the part of my son; and 
that the great distinction which he has since conferred 
upon your name more than justifies my discernment and 
my affection.” 

That son was then at work on his inaugural address, 
which was to carry him, for the first time, before that 
literary tribunal from where he was already longing to 
leap, so soon as his age would permit, before that political 
tribunal which, for many years, had been the aim of all 
his studies. 

When he should reach this summit of his ambition, he 
intended to follow the examples of Monsieur de Serre 
and Monsieur de Laine, and so defend at the same time 
both his masters and his models, the Bourbons (the idols 
of his father and mother), and the Liberal Constitution, 
the principles of which fully satisfied his own mind. He 
desired to defend these principles and those princes 
against the reactionary tendency of the monarchy and 
against the restless impatience of the republic, whose 
hour had not yet come to sound the tocsin of two revolu¬ 
tions, that of July, 1830, and that of February, 1848. 

epilogue. 

It was toward the end of autumn in the year 1829, 
when everything betokened trouble, fever, and delirium 
in the mind and heart of France, no less in the Govern¬ 
ment itself than in the opposing factions. Prince Po- 
lignac, the Prime Minister, had so often and so earnestly 
insisted, in his unofficial and familiar letters, on my 
coming to Paris, where he persisted in reserving for me, 
under his supervision, the management of foreign affairs, 
that at last I concluded to come, not to accept, but to 


256 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


explain in a becoming manner the motives of my refusal, 
and my gratitude for his friendly interest. I liked the 
prince, but feared his policy; and, in speaking to him, it 
was my wish that he should comprehend the distinction 
which I made between the man and the minister, and 
between my personal feelings and my political opinions. 
In my inaugural address before the French Academy, I 
had just defined very clearly my position of respectful 
but decided opposition to the threatened overthrow of 
the Constitution, and to the scarcely dissimulated projects 
of the Government against the rightful liberty of thought 
and the legal openness and independence of the elections. 
This pointedly political peroration, which was hardly ex¬ 
pected from me,—ridiculed as I was in most of the Re¬ 
publican, Orleanist, and Bonapartist journals as a retro¬ 
grading (not to say renegade) royalist,—was received 
with immense applause. Monsieur Laine and Monsieur 
Collard both at once recognized their disciple. In pass¬ 
ing out from the hall of the Institute, which was still 
filled with the concourse, the Duke de Rohan, a friend 
of long standing, whispered in my ear, “ Bid adieu to all 
advancement in your career; you have just disappointed 
our highest hopes, and given encouragement to all the 
hostile factions.” Advancement in my career was a 
matter of little concern with me; but I saw a deep abyss 
only a little way in front of the feet of Charles X., and I 
earnestly desired, so far as it lay in my power, to turn- 
him aside from it. 

Prince Polignac, full of hope and faith in my future, 
had the year before entertained me with a degree of 
political and social familiarity which deeply moved me. 
In his confidence, as well as in his reticence, he had re¬ 
vealed to me a soul truly royal; but, at the same time, he 
displayed a mind prejudiced by his forced residence, his 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


257 

exile abroad, and a heart alarmed by the inner conscious¬ 
ness of its own intentions. 

The prediction of the Duke de Rohan was not realized, 
and I cannot help remembering it to the honor of both 
King Charles X. and Prince Polignac. This Prime Min¬ 
ister manifested no resentment on account of my address 
before the Academy; but, after long and fruitless discus¬ 
sions with me, in the course of very free and friendly 
conversations upon the motives of my refusal, which 
according to his views rested on only slight foundations, 
and after assuring me that no conspiracy to overthrow 
the Constitution was then meditated, he gracefully and 
condescendingly yielded to my resistance, and then 
offered me the honors and duties of Minister Plenipo¬ 
tentiary to Greece. 

This was at a time when Europe was feverishly engaged 
in founding, upon a passing wave of enthusiasm, that arti¬ 
ficial structure of Grecian nationality which was either 
the precious germ or the crumbling ruin of an indefinable 
grand something. I myself shared the general illusion 
which then prevailed among men of liberal minds, and 
especially among classical scholars, in regard to the 
Greeks, who had proved themselves so brave in battle, 
but who were yet so undisciplined in matters of civil gov¬ 
ernment. The Prince of Coburg, widower of Princess 
Charlotte (who had been an heiress to the throne of Eng¬ 
land), had just been designated by the Western Powers as 
king of regenerated Greece. This prince was then in 
Paris. I had known him quite intimately in Italy, when 
in the habiliments of mourning he was there, vainly seek¬ 
ing consolation for his great and irreparable loss. Prince 
Polignac presented me to him as the most suitable min¬ 
ister whom the French Government could then commis 
sion to Greece. I was, I confess, much elated at the idea 

22 * 


258 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


of being present with a title, and with high functions and 
powers, at this resurrection of an empire upon the soil 
of so many glorious memories, and of participating in it 
myself, like Lord Byron, the heroic poet of this national 
resuscitation. The anticipations but too well founded of 
the deceptions, the storms, and the miseries which would 
beset this new birth, suddenly influenced the designated 
king not to accept the responsibility for the future fate 
of this people. He left Paris one night, fleeing from a 
kingdom as a man would flee from the verge of a threat¬ 
ening abyss. 

On awaking the next morning, we learned tnat there 
was no longer any head on which to place this crown, 
which had already been worn, on the one side, or rejected, 
on the other, by so many brows. Diplomacy was then 
obliged to busy itself in choosing another candixlate. For 
that, however, time was necessary; and so 1 remained 
Minister Plenipotentiary in prospective, and continued to 
receive from Prince Polignac every assurance and proof 
of familiarity and of favor compatible with my determina¬ 
tion to abstain from all participation in the interior work¬ 
ings of his government. 

My mother, intoxicated with happiness at this rapid 
advancement in my political career, at my prospective 
residence amid the classic shades of Athens, and at my 
recent election to the French Academy, was smiling at 
the delightful and promising future thus opening up be¬ 
fore a son who in his early days had caused her so many 
anxious cares, but who was now the almost accomplished 
dream of her life. 

I was making the necessary arrangements to spend near 
her the few months which I supposed I had yet to reside 
in France; and I was only prolonging my stay in Paris, 
for a fortnight or so, to prepare and purchase there certain 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


2 59 


little feminine presents, consisting mostly of articles for 
the toilet, which it was -always my custom and happiness 
to take to my mother and sisters whenever I had been 
far away from them. This, though, was but a slight re¬ 
turn, a poor evidence of gratitude, for all the privations 
and sufferings which I had caused her in my youth, for 
the jewelry which she had parted with on my account, 
even to the rings on her fingers, in order to procure me 
a period of leisure, a trip somewhere, a pleasure of some 
sort, or for the purpose of concealing one or more of my 
faults from the just severity of the family. 

The table and all the other articles of furniture in my 
room at Paris were temporarily covered with little boxes, 
jewel-cases, and unfolded bundles of stuffs suitable for 
chamber-hangings and for trimmings, which her happy 
son was collecting together, while thinking with pleasing 
anticipations of his return to the modest home of his 
mother, and the exclamations of surprise and joy which 
his little offerings would then produce. All this I was 
enjoying in advance, filled as I was with the idea of the 
great pleasure these small remembrances would give ; not 
thinking so much of the trifles themselves, which I was 
collecting, but rather of the true and trusty hearts I was 
preparing to make glad with these tiny tokens of my own 
love. 

One evening, about dinner-time (I have no need to 
write the date for myself), I was driving into the court¬ 
yard of my hotel, my buggy loaded with pasteboard boxes 
and other trinkets, such as one is always and everywhere 
apt to find as the appendages of womankind. My coun¬ 
tenance was radiant witfyoy over the thought of my de¬ 
parture, fixed for the next day; and I was about to jump 
from my vehicle to the lower steps of the vestibule, when 
I saw before the doorkeeper’s apartment the dearest of 


260 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


all my friends, the very brother of my soul, Count Aymon 
de Virieu, whom Providence had given me, from the time 
of my tenderest youth up to manhood, seemingly to share 
with him, and he with me, everything in this strange and 
fitful life. After having pursued together the same studies 
in the same colleges, the same reveries in the country 
homes of our respective families, the same routes in our 
travels, the same lines and labyrinths of society in the 
great cities, we were now following the same career in 
the diplomatic service of our country. He himself was 
about to start, the next day, for his post of duty in Ger¬ 
many \ and we had previously arranged to dine together, 
and to pass the evening in my room, in order to prolong 
as much as possible our pleasant conversation, and to 
delay somewhat our leave-taking. 

In getting out of my buggy, to take the Count’s hand 
as usual, I was struck by his paleness, and by the conster¬ 
nation involuntarily depicted on his expressive features. 
His eyes, ordinarily lighted up like two sparks of fire by 
the play of his gay and slightly sarcastic spirit, seemed, 
for the first time, suddenly extinguished. Instead ol 
answering my look of pleasant welcome by one of the 
same kind, his eyes refused to greet mine; and when, a 
moment afterward, our glances did meet,' I saw in the 
depths of his visage a sort of unaccountable sorrow and 
apprehension, mingled with pity. So far from smiling 
with me, his countenance revealed a certain vague bitter¬ 
ness of thought at seeing me so confident and so happy. 
The contented expression of my eyes, and my exhilaration 
of spirit, visibly worried him. He seemed to reproach 
me for my happiness, before telling me that I was doomed 
to be forever sad. His whole person was the living repre¬ 
sentation of some shocking catastrophe or tragic event. 

Joy at once left my eyes, and the smile died away on 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


261 


my lips. “Let us go up to your room,” said he, with 
broken voice. “I have some very sad news to tell you. 
Let us shut ourselves up, and be alone, in your own apart¬ 
ment ; for it will there be necessary for you to summon 
to your aid all the courage and fortitude of your man¬ 
hood.” 

I ascended the stairs as if stunned by a blow on the 
heart. He drew me into my chamber, closed the door, 
and caused me to sit down on the edge of the bed, where 
my poor dog was leaping and frisking around with delight 
at my return, not understanding why his joyful jumps and 
caresses, which were ordinarily responded to with affec¬ 
tionate recognition, had now become to me both trouble¬ 
some and repulsive. “Speak,” said I to Virieu, covering 
my face with my hands, and trying meanwhile to prepare 
myself for the unknown. Ah, that, though, is the very 
worst of torture, for all parts of our being, yea, even our 
souls, seem to be threatened at once! 

Then, with all the slowness and caution, with all the 
careful approaches and prudent retreatings, all the feeling 
around and probing, sometimes timid, sometimes bold, 
of a man charged with the duty of communicating an 
unexpected and terrible message, which is to pierce the 
heart without causing absolute death, he finished by say¬ 
ing, as he received my almost lifeless form in his arms, 
“No longer have you a mother!” It seemed to me 
that the earth itself was reeling from under my feet, and 
that the very germs and bases were being removed from 
my entire existence, past, present, and future. My soul 
mounted, by a single bound, to heaven, and so followed 
her who had been my first and purest life here below, and 
without whom it had hardly ever occurred to me that I 
should some day have to live. 

She was so beautiful, so active, seemingly so young, and 


262 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


apparently so full of life for the future, that the idea of 
an eternal-separation had really never presented itself to 
me, except in the far-off distance, softened by the gradual 
approach of old age, and by the shortness of the time 
which I should myself have to pass in the world, after a 
slowly-pronounced and piously-prolonged farewell. The 
separation had already come; it came without gradation, 
and without farewell. In the morning, I was verily living 
in two bodies; but when the evening came, the one poor 
heart in my breast was in torture, groaning and crying 
out its agony, and seeming no longer to beat, except in 
the feebler and less worthy half of its existence. As if 
to fill my cup of sorrow to the very brim, fate, as touch¬ 
ing my family, had left me quite alone in Paris. She who 
would have lovingly borne an almost equal share of my 
despair, and would most certainly and sincerely have 
mingled her tears and sobs with my own, was no longer 
there. Neither wife, nor child, nor mother ! Nothing 
but an oppressive emptiness, a distressful void, within, 
without, here, there, everywhere, forever ! Fortunately, 
however, I had near me one friend, who covered over, 
with his affectionate tenderness, the yawning abyss of 
sorrows into which I was about to plunge when his kind 
hand restrained me. 

I remained on my bed, still dressed, prostrate with 
grief, and, as it were, annihilated, the whole evening and 
the whole night. That evening and that night, of which 
each sleepless and woe-inflicting minute is still present 
with me, as if unaffected by the lapse of time, were 
passed in wringing from the heart and tongue of my 
friend the particulars of that most doleful death. The 
circumstances were almost as heart-rending as the event 
itself had been sudden. I learned them one by one from 
the lips of Monsieur de Virieu. He did not leave me 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


263 


until the dawn, and then only to make the necessary prep¬ 
arations for my departure and return to Macon. Alas, 
it was already too late to embrace, at least before her 
burial, the remains of her who had lovingly borne me 
nine months in her womb, and all my life in her heart. 

Here, then, is what my friend told me of the circum¬ 
stances of her death, and also what relatives and servants 
added afterward to the narrative of that agony of which 
they themselves had been the eye-witnesses: 

My mother was expecting me from day to day, with an 
impatience full of happiness. Her alternate and lively 
hopes and joys, and the deep emotions she had felt at 
my election to the French Academy and my quickly suc¬ 
ceeding appointment as Minister to Greece, had brought 
upon her a slight fever. On the 27th of November, after 
having, according to her custom, attended mass before 
daylight, she went directly from the church to the public 
baths, which are kept by the Sisters of Charity of the city, 
in the large asylum which bears their name. The Superior 
of the Sisterhood, who received her, and who conversed 
with her a moment on pious subjects while her bath was 
being prepared, relates that she spoke with that peculiar 
kindness of heart and cheerfulness of spirit which inva¬ 
riably characterized the gentleness of her disposition in 
her best days. When the bath was ready, she went into 
it without any attendant, according to the habit which, as 
a member of the Sisterhood of Salles, she had formed in 
early life, and which she had scrupulously preserved even 
after her marriage, of never employing any one in matters 
of minor personal requirements; for she always dressed 
and undressed herself, and made her own fires, in devout 
remembrance of the poverty and humility of the great 
Founder of Christianity. 

She had been in the bath some minutes, when the 


264 MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 

Superior of the Sisterhood, in passing along the corridor 
which communicated with the doors of the bath-cells, 
heard a cry from her cell, followed by a smothered groan. 
She hastily entered. The bath-tub was overflowing with 
boiling water, and steam was rising from the floor. The 
neck of the faucet through which the hot water flowed 
was wide open, and great streams of the boiling element 
were pouring forcibly upon the bare breast and shoulders 
of my poor mother. From the very first the shock 
seems to have rendered her unconscious. She was hur¬ 
riedly taken out, in the arms of the Lady Superior and 
an assistant, from that pitiless cascade of fire, more than 
half dead already. It was evident that, wishing more hot 
water in the bath, she had quickly opened the full orifice 
of the pipe, and that the sudden and irresistible rush of 
the boiling liquid upon her breast unnerved her com¬ 
pletely, so that she had neither the strength nor the time 
to reclose the faucet. The cool air restored her breath 
and consciousness. She kissed the Lady Superior, who 
had badly scalded her own hands and arms in drawing 
her out of the bath-tub. 

They placed her on one of the mattresses of the asy¬ 
lum, and then four of the inmates, who were poor girls 
selected from among the abler cases of incurables, to 
whom, during twenty years, she herself had so often 
brought linen and medicine and food, carried her back 
from the asylum to her home. The rumor of this sad and 
distressing event had already spread throughout the city. 
The crowds of early-rising servants and pious women 
coming out of the churches followed her to her door, 
weeping, and praying to God for her recovery. A public 
lamentation was heard in all the streets through which the 
litter passed ; and it really seemed as if the city was losing 
its mother, as I was losing mine. Physicians were sum- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


265 


moned, and they came in haste. The accident did not 
appear to be fatal; but, in the evening, the removal of 
the first dressing from her wounds revealed the great 
gravity of her condition. She had an attack of fever, 
and soon became delirious. 

Her delirium, or rather her dream, was like her charac¬ 
ter, always gentle and smiling in its manifestations. She 
would become rational at times, long enough to thank, 
with touching simplicity and sincerity, the women who 
were serving her, and to console and cheer, with prolonged 
hope, my poor father, who knelt at her bedside, stricken 
by a blow which had completely overcome his ordinary 
powers of endurance. 

By a supreme effort of the will, she almost forgot her 
sufferings, and gave her thoughts freely, up to her very 
last hour, to those who loved her on earth, and to God in 
heaven, whom she already saw through faith. She wished 
to unite herself once more with Him in that holy sacra¬ 
ment in which her faith had so often realized the posses¬ 
sion of divinity by the creature, as well as the possession 
of the creature by divinity. One might have come to the 
conclusion that her bright and beautiful features, glowing 
with the fervor of conviction, and sanctified by that mys¬ 
terious union, was illuminating the darkness of her bed 
more than the wax candles which the kneeling children 
of the asylum were holding up in their hands, behind the 
curtains. 

A great calm, a long silence, and a sweet sleep, which 
again awakened the hopes of all, followed this ceremony 
for the dying. False glimmer ! Deceitful appearance ! 
She awoke only to expire, yet with all the love and 
lucidness of her heart and mind. She who was present 
in this last agony, in the shadows of the falling night, 
and who, by her tender and affectionate care, was trying 
m 23 


266 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


to supply my absence, has often repeated to me literally 
the broken words of her dream-like delirium, which she 
pronounced, from time to time, in her sweetest voice, 
until morning: 

“ My husband, . . . my children, . . . Alphonse, 
Marianne, Cecilia, Eugenia, Sophie; God bless them all! 
Oh that they were all here now, so that He might bless 
them by my hand ! My Alphonse! How grieved he 
will be not to have been near me in this supreme hour! 
Tell him, oh, tell him that I suffer no more! . . . 
that I feel already as if I were in a place of safety, 
peace, and delight, where I behold heaven for myself, 
and manifold blessings in store for all my dear children 
who are yet on the earth.” . . . 

Then, falling again into what seemed a sweet slumber, 
during which an occasional smile would play upon her 
lips, she only came out of it to speak a few words which, 
toward daybreak, they heard her stammer feebly: “Oh, 
how hnppy I am ! How happy I am! My God, Thou 
hast not deceived me ! Blessed be Thy name ! Happy 
am I! I am so happy!” And with these words she 
gave up to God her last sigh. Si;ch, then, is, word for 
word, the account of her death. All the witnesses are 
still there, to tell it over again, except my father and poor 
Philiberte, who in losing her mistress lost all her desire 
to live, and who, indeed, lived only long enough to con 
tinue to render faithfully to her master the services which 
she devoted to him chiefly through admiration and grati¬ 
tude to my mother. Oh, what a noble and holy exchange 
do we find emanating from that tie of domestic relation¬ 
ship which springs up between the servant who serves for 
love and the family which rewards that service with thank¬ 
fulness, with affection, and with well-considered equality 
before the tribunal of the heart! It is a relationship 


MY MO THER 'S MANUSCRIPT. 


267 

between the different classes and ranks upon the earth, 
distinct by fortune, but leveled by just and kindly senti¬ 
ment. 

It was already three days that I had no longer a mother 
when I arrived at Macon, in the hope of being able to 
see once more, at least under the shroud of death, her 
dear and saintly features. I was accompanied by a perfect 
friend, a true Samaritan, who was always found near me 
during my times of greatest anguish, Amedee de Perseval, 
whom a heart-remembrance, to which allusion is made in 
the manuscript, bound faithfully to my mother, of whom 
he had vainly desired to become also a son. It was too 
late. The coffin was already resting under heaps of snow, 
in the frozen ground of the city cemetery. In the absence 
of my poor father, forced away, almost dying, from his 
home at the very moment of her last sigh, and in the 
absence of her children, far away in their respective places 
of residence, they forgot that the deceased had frequently 
expressed her preference for the cemetery of Saint Point, 
under the shadow of the little village church, where her 
piety used to lead her so often to meditate on holy things, 
during her summer pastimes in that beautiful valley of 
peace. I found nothing to kiss but the head-board of 
her bedstead, which had been taken apart on account 
of her death, the floor of her chamber, and the threshold 
of her door, through which had passed her coffin, amid 
the sobbing of the whole city, on its way to the common 
field of the dead. 

My heart revolted against the idea that the oft-expressed 
desire of this sainted woman should not be fulfilled after 
her transfiguration, and also against the idea of not being 
able to visit her loved remains except by passing through 
a crowd of the unknown dead, or among those of little 
or no interest to me. I resolved, therefore, while it was 


268 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


yet time, to repair, so far as it was in my power to do so, 
this neglect of her earnest wish, and to exhume the coffin, 
in order to transport it to the hallowed place of her choice. 
It seemed to me that the infinite distance between her soul 
and myself would be materially lessened if her coffin were 
only reposing somewhere between the threshold of my 
own abode and that of the neighboring church of Saint 
Point. To tell the whole truth, however, there was, in 
this disinterment, a pretext and an opportunity to see 
once more, but never again, her adored features, before 
time, the great destroyer of all things, should reduce her 
body to a handful of dust. The coffin had no mark to 
distinguish it from other coffins, and the grave-digger had 
not even marked the spot where the fast-falling snow had 
since effaced the signs of his spade. It therefore became 
necessary to open the coffin, in order to assure ourselves 
that we were not deceived, and that we were not carrying 
away, in our hearts and hands, the relics of some one 
unknown, instead of the remains of my mother. 

I spare myself the recital of some of the more mourn¬ 
ful details. Everything was accomplished during the 
night as I had wished. We removed' the snow which had 
heaped itself upon the grave; and then, groping in the 
dark, we found the coffin among other receptacles of the 
dead. Philiberte, who had carefully dressed and laid out 
her dear mistress, recognized the coffin immediately; and 
it was then opened to afford me a short, transitory view, 
by the glimmer of the tapers, of the sleeping countenance. 
I saw before me my mother, complete in all her features 
and beauty of face, except her eyes, and her animation. 
It was indeed my mother; but yet I could see her only 
through the veil of eternity which had been lifted up 
between us. My lips touched her forehead with both 
terror ‘and love. The coffin received my tears. It was 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


269 

closed again. I alone watched by it with Philiberte, 
while waiting for the hour of night, when the peasants 
of Milly were to come, one by one, and without noise, 
to bear away upon their shoulders, in a march of four 
hours, the dead body of their lady. 

At midnight we began our dreary walk, over a deep 
layer of crusted snow, through the long suburban road 
which leads from the city to the first hills of our moun¬ 
tainous horizon. Although the mournful train of attend¬ 
ants had been strictly limited by me to myself alone of 
all the members of the family, and to the farmers and 
laborers attached to her estate at Milly, yet the wives 
and children of these honest and kind-hearted people, 
clad in their poor dresses of disconsolation, had deemed 
themselves entitled, by right of affection, to follow the 
head of the family, and were lengthening out upon the 
highway the already long black file of weepers, whose 
copious and heart-bred tears there had been no need of 
purchasing. Not a voice, not a whisper, was heard from 
that large procession during the whole long march. The 
only sounds audible were those made by the women walk¬ 
ing and leading their little children by the hand over the 
hardened snow, and, from time to time, the sudden and 
grating noise of the oak coffin as it received a slight 
shock in the change of its place on the shoulders of the 
bearers, who vied with each other in their eagerness to 
take turns under the holy burden. 

After marching two hours and a half from the city, we 
left the main road, and, by a cross-path covered with 
icicles, ascended the steep hill upon the top of which is 
built the little hamlet of Milly. All the people were 
awake, and on the threshold of every cottage was to be 
seen an old man or a little child, holding a lighted lamp, 
or a taper, which threw its glimmering rays on pale faces, 

23* 


270 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


weeping eyes, and hands shivering with the extreme cold 
of that raw December night. 

Arriving at last in the court-yard of the house, the 
bearers of the bier, followed by all the inhabitants of 
the village, mounted the five steps of the stoop, and laid 
the coffin down in that same vestibule where she was ac¬ 
customed to receive, every morning, the sick and needy, 
distributing to them food and ointments and clothing, 
and dressing the sprains and bruises of the wounded, on 
her knees beside them. The same benches of walnut- 
wood upon which they used to stretch their limbs, bound 
around with salve-lined linen rags, were the very ones 
which served, on that cold night of sorrow, to support 
her cofiui. There she was, prostrate in death, on the 
very instruments of her charity. A great sob then burst 
forth from the swollen hearts of all the cottagers who 
were there assembled. Each one drew near to dip a 
branch of boxwood in the vessel of holy water at the 
head of her bed, and to shed upon her coffin their stream¬ 
ing tears. During this halt under the roof of her youth 
and of her love, I withdrew alone into her chamber, and 
there buried my face in the drapery of her empty bed. 
From that sanctuary of my grief I heard, for a long time, 
the cloggy noise of the footsteps, in wooden shoes, of 
the men and women going up and down the stony stoop, 
to take their turns at briefly kneeling and praying in the 
vestibule. 

Thus we waited for the first rays of daylight before 
venturing into the narrow pass of the high mountain, 
deeply covered with fine snow, which had been so drifted 
by the north wind that it concealed the paths and filled 
up the ravines. It might have been perilous to follow 
those paths in the dark; and I was unwilling that the 
small party which was to bear the body of my mother 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


271 


from her house at Milly to the cemetery of Saint Point 
should run any risk whatever of their own lives. 

The moment that the dawn began to color the tops of 
the far-off Alps, which were visible from Milly, we set out 
again, escorted by the weeping villagers as far as the sum¬ 
mit of the first hill which overlooks the gardens and vine¬ 
yards of the estate. At the curve of the high valley we 
dismissed the train of mourners, who seemed to be losing 
their Providence; and our little group of eight hardy men 
at once made their entrance into the rough, narrow, and 
difficult pass which leads to the top of the mountain, and 
which is called the Cross of Signals. Four of these men 
marched in front of the coffin, in order to test the depth 
of the snow and to clear the path, whilst the four others 
were carrying my mother. I walked alone, behind them, 
stepping in the depressions made by their great wooden 
shoes. The snow, in some places, was up to our knees. 
It deadened every noise, except the sharp, shrill whistling 
of the north wind. 

Two little birds, which seemingly had lost their way, 
not finding any other solid spot on which to alight, came 
once and perched themselves on the black cloth of the 
coffin, which the bearer had laid down for a few mo¬ 
ments on the edge of a ravine, so as to be free to scrape 
off with their knives the accumulated and impeditive 
snow on the soles of their shoes. I know not wherefore, 
but true it is, that these little birds, seeking food and 
shelter upon a coffin, melted me to tears. Doubtless it 
brought back to my mind a glimpse of all the sufferings 
and sorrows of which that sympathizing heart had been 
the sanctuary whilst its pulsations were yet strong. The 
birds warbled two or three plaintive notes, and then, 
taking wing again, fluttered about us as we passed on to¬ 
ward Saint Point. I thought immediately of the spirits of 


272 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


Cesarine and Suzanne, and imagined that they had come, 
under the symbols of those pretty little wings, to receive 
their mother, and to precede and safely conduct her to 
her final resting-place. It is not difficult to conceive the 
superstitions to which a man may be subjected when his 
heart and head are excited beyond the control of reason. 
There are times when every man becomes more or less 
like a woman, and when the greatest vigor of his man¬ 
hood yields to the enervation of tears. 

Our plodding journey, which, in the season of fine 
weather, requires but two hours to accomplish, then, in 
that ocean of snowy billows, threatening every instant to 
swallow us all up, lasted seven hours. There were some 
passages along the deep ravines, in descending on the 
other side toward the valley of Saint Point, where our 
only guides were the great black trunks of dead chestnut- 
trees, bending over the abyss, and where we might have 
perished but for the skill and vigor of these robust peas¬ 
ants of Milly. Their precious burden seemed to inspire 
them with both strength and confidence. 

Arriving just as the shades of evening began to acquire 
the density of night, we deposited the coffin, as we had 
done at Milly, in the room and upon the bed of my 
mother, which, for several years past, had become my 
own. I shut myself up in a small tower, which serves as a 
closet to the chamber, and, stretching a mattress upon the 
floor, watched alone, with the door of the chamber open 
between my deceased mother and myself, through the last 
long and wintry night that those beloved remains were to 
pass under the roof of her old home. It may seem some¬ 
what strange, but still I fancied that in thus prolonging 
my vigil over her body I was also prolonging the more 
immediate presence of her spirit with me. God alone 
knows the tears, the invocations, the blessings, the reve- 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


273 


lations of that night! Toward daybreak I fell asleep, 
through sheer exhaustion. When I awoke, the bell was 
already calling the inhabitants from all the little hamlets 
of the surrounding mountains to the ceremony of the 
second burial. Yet, after all, it was not to be the last of 
her sepulture; for, by a strange coincidence of unforeseen 
circumstances, it seemed as if the earth itself was alter¬ 
nately receiving and giving back again the remains whose 
possession was disputed by old-time love and veneration, 
even to the tomb. Extending my view out upon the 
two immense slopes of snow, which formed the larger of 
the two great valleys before me, I saw what seemed to 
be dark clouds descending and advancing from all the 
thatched roofs, isolated or grouped together, on the two 
hill-sides, toward the church and toward the house. All 
the country for a great distance around had put on 
mourning, and the heart-melting cries of uncontrollable 
and convulsive lamentation were borne on the wind, from 
the cemetery to my ears. 

There had been no preparation in this cemetery for a 
permanent interment. Death had surprised us without a 
tomb. - If my mother had been consulted, as my father 
was, in regard to the exact locality and manner of her 
last resting-place on earth, her heavenly-minded freedom 
from all care for her mortal remains would doubtless have 
caused her to request final lodgment in the common 
ground of the poor and humble. But she had not had 
time nor opportunity to make known specifically her pref¬ 
erences in this matter, and had only expressed, in general 
terms, a vague desire to be interred at Saint Point. I 
could not reconcile myself to the idea of permitting the 
traces of those relics to be lost to my own self, to my 
sisters, to my sisters’ children, nor to that innumerable 
family of peasants, who were as much related to her by 


274 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


affection as we ourselves were by blood. Already, indeed, 
in the inhumation of countless numbers of others there¬ 
about, had the law of oblivion been amply observed 
under the grass and moss upon which the cattle were in 
the habit of grazing in the common field of the church. 
No ! my mother’s remains should have a well-marked and 
durable shrine of love and sanctitude, to which they were 
entitled. I therefore resolved to build a little family 
sepulchre, where we, as her immediate descendants, might 
go and rejoin her, if God should so ordain that we should 
die where we had lived and loved. 

The sight and the surroundings of the garden at Saint 
Point were very favorable to this idea of a small mauso¬ 
leum. The church and the mansion stood on the same 
hill, which rose in the middle of the valley, like the 
pedestal of an ancient temple. The church is so wedged 
in among the terraces and inclosures of the mansion that 
it is evident to the eye that it was formerly dependent on 
it, and that, in the ages long past, it was probably the 
chapel of a feudal castle. To-day the gardens of the 
estate are separated from the rustic; cemetery, which sur¬ 
rounds the church, only by a hedge of boxwood and 
hazel-bushes, overtopped by a few old walnut-trees, whose 
nuts are common property, and fall as soon as ripe, 
under the energetic and mischievous efforts of the juvenile 
peasants, upon the neglected graves of the dead. The 
black walls and the Roman belfry of the church add, in 
summer, the coolness of their shade to that of the hedge 
of hazel-bushes, and invest this part of the garden with 
something of the obscurity, retirement, and melancholy 
of a sanctuary. This was always the favorite retreat of 
my mother, during the warm hours of mid-day, in the 
month of harvest. From the windows of my little tower 
I used to be delighted to see her there, with a book in 


MY MOTHERS MANUSCRIPT. 


275 


her hand, upon a rustic chair, supported at the back by 
a cherry-tree, which rose above the thicket, and whose 
branches, red with fruit, were hanging over her head. 

In the very midst of my grief, I experienced a certain 
solid sort of solace in thinking that, though dead, she 
would yet repose in the same well-chosen spot of the gar¬ 
den, under the same shade, surrounded by the same lawn 
strewn with leaves and fruits, where she used to rest and 
read and enjoy herself so much during her life. I therefore 
determined to build her sepulchre there, upon our own 
private ground, where it might continue to be the dearest 
possession of the family. But as no one to-day can be 
assured of the stability of any property whatever, not even 
that of a family sepulchre, and as adversity may transfer a 
tomb, as well as a tract of land, from one proprietor to an¬ 
other, I foresaw a remote contingency wherein creditors 
or indifferent persons might become the owners of the 
mansion and gardens, and did not wish that her children 
or grandchildren should ever be dispossessed, by sale or 
otherwise, of the mortal remains of a mother, as if they 
were a merchantable thing to be traded off some day, and 
so permitted to pass irreverently and unconcernedly from 
hand to hand. I therefore meditated the purpose which 
I have since accomplished, of giving the ground of this 
garden, wherein the sepulchre was to be built, to the vil¬ 
lage, on condition of their preventing forever its desecra¬ 
tion ; and in order that this charge might not be burden¬ 
some to the parish, I agreed to give, in consideration, as 
much additional land, adjoining the church property, as 
would be required for the construction of a parsonage, 
which was lacking, and also to build the parsonage at my 
own expense. The law which guarded the interests of the 
corporation was in no way antagonistic to a proposition 
prospectively so advantageous to the inhabitants of the 


27 6 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


valley, and accordingly the contract was ratified in good 
time, without the raising of any sort of opposition or 
difficulty. 

As, however, I could not bear the thought that, during 
my lifetime, nor so long as persons of the same blood, 
after me, should possess the residence, the sepulchre, thus 
inclosed at once, should be taken from our sight and 
from our domestic worship, I projected, and soon after¬ 
ward erected, a simple but substantial wall, high enough 
for all purposes of protection, and covered over with ivy, 
so that it might form a sufficient boundary between the 
cemetery and the garden, and at the same time permit 
us to recline against it from the inside, and there recall 
our memories, shed our tears, and repeat our prayers and 
invocations, without being seen by those who might be 
indifferent to our sorrows. 

It was during my sad watch by the side of the coffin, 
which in the morning was to be forever removed from my 
sight, that the instincts of affection which were struggling 
in my breast against the inevitable separation suggested 
to me, and enabled me to combine, in a mechanical man¬ 
ner, all the details of the final interment! I had already 
conceived an imperfect idea of it at Macon, and had ob¬ 
tained from the Government a permit to deposit the coffin 
temporarily under the slabs of the church, in the large 
vault of the ancient noblemen of Saint Point, the illus¬ 
trious Rocheforts. What of all that I possessed in this 
world would I not have given to have had, then and there, 
repeated for us, in reality, a miracle similar to the one 
which is reported to have taken place, in that very vault, 
a century ago ? 

As local tradition will have it, a young Marchioness of 
Saint Point, who Had been married only a few weeks, having 
fallen into a long fainting-fit, was supposed to be dead, and 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


2 77 


was buried in an open coffin under the arched vault of the 
church. The stone which closes the vault, under the feet of 
the choristers, had been properly fastened in its place over 
her sepulchre. On the evening following her interment, 
the sexton, going to ring the bell for vespers, heard groans 
under the marble slabs. He ran away terrified, and went 
immediately to the castle to tell his strange story. The 
disconsolate husband and his servants, all in tears, ran at 
once to the sepulchre, and there listened to the subter¬ 
ranean voice, which, in truth, struck their ears. They 
quickly removed the stone, which had been,sealed in its 
place, descended into the vault, and, to their inexpressible 
surprise and delight, found the lady alive. She was affec¬ 
tionately and tenderly carried home in the arms of her 
rescuers, and, being still young and beautiful, she gave 
many long and happy years to her husband before going 
down again, in good old age, to the place of her last 
earthly repose. In my boyhood I had often heard the 
bell-ringer himself and his aged spouse tell about this 
alleged miracle, of which they themselves had been eye¬ 
witnesses, and of which most of the old people of the vil¬ 
lage still clearly remembered the circumstances. Alas, 
miracles of vivification are not wrought for all who 
mourn! 

In the early morning the coffin was transferred from 
the bed to the church, and followed by the people of 
twelve hamlets in mourning and in tears. On our way 
to the church, we crossed the garden by that same alley 
of hazel-bushes, through which I had so often seen the 
good woman returning from the altar with her counte¬ 
nance full of sorrow and deep thought, or all aglow with 
conscious piety and happiness. My own hands helped to 
lower the corpse and lay it in its eternal abode. I went 
back to the house alone, and shut myself up in the tower, 

24 


2 7 8 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


turning the key. Tears have their modesty, like all 
things that are hid in the depths of the heart. I pros¬ 
trated myself on the floor, my hands on my forehead, 
my eyes fixed on the steeple of the church, and my ears 
involuntarily listening to the melancholy tolling of the 
bell, whose regular ringing, morning and evening, used 
to be so dear to her, and which was now also, in deep 
and expressive mourning for her, sending the sounds of 
its sorrowful sighs over all the surrounding hills. My 
mind was busy with those solemn and sacred thoughts 
which are never spoken on earth. All that I now re¬ 
member with distinctness is that my ideas, rendered 
morbid and feverish by so many days of sleepless emo¬ 
tion and anguish, were echoing and re-echoing in my 
empty head with a noise somewhat like the beating of 
an iron sledge upon a big bronze drum, and were vi¬ 
brating, even while I wept, in unison and cadence with 
the bell; so that the secret hymns of my heart seemed 
to be sobs, and my sobs seemed to be hymns. What a 
strange contradiction in our nature, at once material and 
intellectual, when the senses become giddy, and the ear 
oscillates and tingles while the soul groans ! 

Toward morning I fell into a light slumber, but soon 
awoke to resume with my guides the snowy paths of the 
mountain, where we again narrowly escaped envelopment 
beneath the fleecy drifts. The bright but icy rays of the 
winter sun seemed to be only a mockery, alike of the 
season and of my grief. I was anxious to return to con¬ 
sole my father and other grievously distressed members 
of the family. That winter was to us all, indeed, both 
as to duration and severity, more than one ordinary 
winter. 

Thus it is, my sisters, my nearest of living kindred, 
thus it is that we lost our mother; and thus it is also 


MY MOTHER'S MANUSCRIPT. 


279 


that our little scope of country lost, in a single woman, 
its grace, its charm, and its protector. Ask the first 
widow or old man you may meet on the road to Saint 
Point, to Milly, or to Macon ! 

Let us, as the first generation of her descendants, 
dutifully and affectionately cherish her memory. This 
is why I have transcribed her manuscript. We ourselves 
will soon disappear, one by one, each of us bearing a 
portion of love and sorrow for her. These pages will 
help to preserve to her later descendants, for a brief 
period, the memory of her heaven-born virtues and ex¬ 
cellence ; and then, like ourselves, they, too, will become 
dust. Behold the evanescent significance of a book; 
behold the fleeting fate of a generation ! 
















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»> 







AN ALPHABETICAL INDEX 

TO 

LEADING NAMES AND SUBJECTS. 


Arquebuse, a Knight of the, 45. 

Bankrupt merchant, 128. 

Birch, Marianne, 185, 188, 195, 196. 

Births in war-time, 41. 

Bonaparte’s death, 218. 

Bonaparte’s fall, 158. 

Bonaparte’s marriage, 138. 

Bow-and-arrow correspondence, 45. 

Children of the family, 56, 167, 16S. 

Day of the dead, 15. 

Diary of Madame Lamartine, 55. 

Fainting of a female orphan, 80. 

Felicite, Mademoiselle, 81. 

Friendship, 197. 

Going to the Alps to cool off a courtship, 133. 

Gossiping about neighbors, 108. 

Government, forms of, discussed, 199-201. 

Hailstorms destructive to vineyards, 92, 94. 

Happiness of married life, 116, 167, 168. 

Honest men, 92, 129. 

Huruge, Mademoiselle Saint, 76. 

Increase of family, 93, 104, 152, 163, 183, 204, 208, 216. 

Inheritance under the law of primogeniture, 49. 

Javogue, Proconsul, 47. 

Lamartine, Alice de Roy, 33-36, 50-59, 250-255, 259-279. 

Lamartine, Alphonse de, 13, 107, 129, 136, 143-149, 161, 163, 185, 189, 
192, 193, 194, 198, 217-219, 221-225, 229, 239-244. 

Lamartine, Cecilia de (Cessia), 142, 182. 

Lamartine, C6sarine de (Vignet), 166, 167, 178, 179, 196. 

Lamartine, Eugenia de (Coppens), 164, 165. 

281 



282 


ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 


Lamartine, Mademoiselle de, 76-78, 125, 233. 

Lamartine, Monsieur de, 76, 77, 100, 125, 232, 233. 
Lamartine, Sophie de (Ligonne), 93, 232, 234. 

Lamartine, Suzanne de (Montherot), 183, 204, 205-215. 
Lamartine, the Abbot of, 102, 127, 141, 169, 229. 

Lamartine, the Chevalier de, 36-38, 43, 49-53, 159, 245, 246. 
Little wooden-shod shepherds, 88-90. 

Milly, description of, 60-66. 

Milly, the old homestead at, 69. 

Mountain musings, 87, 95, 181, 182. 

Musings and scenes about Milly, 15-22, 29-31. 

New-year resolutions, 130. 

Novel-reading, 78, 133, 134, 143. 

Nuns, 122. 

Old man with only a goat, 57-59. 

Opera, the, 147, 148. 

Passing the time, 127, 128, 133, 135, 137, 138. 

Peddlers, 94. 

Poems, 22, 27, 69, 170. 

Political dissensions, 150, 1S4, 199-201, 235, 239. 

Poor woman in child-bed, hi. 

Poor woman (another) without bread, 84. 

Praying always, 104, 132, 195, 202, 203. 

Preservation of a female corpse, 116. 

Proscription of certain books, 133, 143. 

Rejoicing at the return of peace, 155-159. 

Religion and virtue, 118, 119, 160, 161, 166. 

Resuscitation of the nationality of Greece, 257. 
Retrospection, 244, 249. 

Roland, Madame, 133. 

Ronchaud, Louis de, 9. 

Rousseau, J. J., 35, no, 144. 

Sinning against charity, 119. 

Solitude a pleasure, 131. 

The Old Homestead at Milly (poem), 69. 

The Spring in the Woods (poem), 170. , 

The Village Bell (poem), 27. 

Thoughts on the Dead (poem), 22. 

Voltaire, 34. 

War troubles, 149, 154, 155, 162, 163. 

Well off in the world, 124, 156, 193, 194. 

Yearning of man’s spirit, 119. 


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Eleonore. A Romance. After the German of J5, 

VON Rothenfels, author of “ On the Vistula,” « Heath- 
flower,” etc. By Frances Elizabeth Bennett, translator 
of “ Lowly Ways.” i2mo. Fine cloth. Ornamented. $1.50. 


“ A vivid reproduction of German 
ife and character.”— Boston Globe. 

“ A bright, readable novel.”— Phil¬ 
adelphia Evening Bulletin. 


“ The plot is developed with remark 
able skill.”— Boston Saturday Eve 
ning Gazette. 


Tom Pippin's Wedding. A Novel. By the Au¬ 
thor of “ The Fight at Dame Europa’s School.” i6mo. 
Extra cloth. $1.25. Paper cover. 75 cents. 


“ We must confess that its perusal 
tas caused us more genuine amuse¬ 
ment than we have derived from any 
fiction, not professedly comic, for many 
a long day. . . . Without doubt this 
is, if not the most remarkable, cer¬ 


tainly the most original, novel of the 
day.”— London Bookseller. 

“ It is fresh in characterization, and 
is as instructive as it is entertaining.” 
—Boston Evening Traveller. 


Irene. A Tale of Southern Life. Illustrated; and 

HATHAWAY STRANGE. 8vo. Paper cover. 35 cents. 

“ They are both cleverly written.”— ten. They are lively, gossippy and 
New Orleans Times. genial.”— Baltimore Gazette. 

“ These stories are pleasantly writ- 


Wcarithorne; or> In the Light of To-Day . A 


Novel. By “ Fadette,” author of “ Ingemisco ” and 
“ Randolph Honor.” i2mo. Extra cloth. *$1.50. 


“ Written with exceptional dramatic 
s or and terseness, and with strong 
powers of personation.” — Philadel¬ 
phia North A merican. 

“ It is written with vigor, and the 
characters are sketched with a marked 
indi viduali ty. ”— L iterary Gazette. 


“ The style is clever and terse, the 
characters are boldly etched, and with 
strong individualities .”—New Orleans 
Times. 

“ Simply and tenderly written.”— 
Washington Chronicle. 


Steps Upward. A Temperance Tale . _ By Mrs. 

F. D. Gage, author of “Elsie Magoon,” etc. i2mo. Extra 
cloth. $1.50. 


“‘Steps Upward,’by Mrs. Frances 
Dana Gage, is a temperance story of 
m< re than ordinary interest. Diana 
Dinmont, the heroine, is an earnest, 
womanly character, and in her own 
gpward progress helps many another 


to a better life .”—New York Independ¬ 
ent. 

“We are sure no reader can but en¬ 
joy and profit by it.” — New Yor\ 
Evetting Mail. 


Minna Monte. A Novel. By “ Stella." \2mo. 


$1.25. 

“ A domestic story possessing great 
spirit and many other attractive fea¬ 
tures. *— Si. Louis Republican. 


“We have in this little volume &a 
agreeable storv, pleasantly told.” 
Pittsburg Gazette 









PUBLICATIONS OF J. B. LIPPINCOTT &- CO. 


Thrown Together. A Story. By Florence Mont • 

gomery, author of “ Misunderstood,” “ A Very Simple 


Story,” etc. i2mo, Fine 

“ The author of Misunderstood ’ 
fas given us another charming story 
cf child-life. This, however, is not a 
hook for children. Adult readers of 
Mbs Montgomery’s book will find 
ouch that will lead them to profitable 
at flection of childish character and 
oany graphically touched terms of 
childish thought and expression which 
will come home to their own experi¬ 
ence.”— London A thenaum. 

“ A delightful story, founded upon 
the lives of children. There is a 
thread of gold in it upon which are 
strung many lovely sentiments. There 


cloth. $1.50. 

is a deep and strong current of religious 
feeling throughout the story, not a 

f >rosy, unattractive lecturing upcn re- 
igious subjects. A good, true and 
earnest life is depicted, full of hopa 
and longing, and of happy fruition. 
One cannot read this book without 
being better for it, or without a more 
tender charity being stirred up in hig 
heart.”— Washington Daily Chron¬ 
icle. 

“ The characters are drawn with a 
delicacy that lends a charm to the 
book.” — Boston Saturday Evening 
Gazette. 


Why Did He Not Die ? or , The Child from the 

Ebraergang. From the German of Ad. von Volckhauser. 
By Mrs. A. L. Wister, translator of “ Old Mam’selle’s Se¬ 


cret,” “ Gold Elsie,” etc. 

“ Mrs. Wister’s admirable transla¬ 
tions are among the books that every- 
Dody reads. She certainly may be 
said to possess unusual ability in re¬ 
taining the peculiar weird flavor of a 
German story, while rendering it with 
perfect ease and grace into our own 
language. Few recently published 
novels have received more general 


i2mo. Fine cloth. $1.75. 

perusal and approval than * Only a 
Girland ‘ Why Did He Not Die.-* 
possesses in at least an equal degree 
all the elements of popularity. From 
the beginning to the end the interest 
never flags, and the characters and 
scenes are drawn with great warirth 
and power.”— New York Herald. 


Aytoun. A Romance. By Entity T. Read. Sro. 

Paper cover. 40 cents. 

“The fabric is thoroughly wrought | “There are elements of power is 
and truly dramatic.” — Philadelphi a j the novel, and some exciting scenes.* 
North American. \ — New York Evening Mail. 


Old Song and Nezu. A Volume of Poems. By 

Margaret T. Preston, author of “ Beechenbrook.” I2ma 


Tinted paper. Extra cloth 

“ In point of variety and general 
grace of diction, ‘Old Song and New’ 
s the best volume of poems that has 
/et been written by an American 
v. man, whether North or South -the 
>est, because on the whole the best 
u stained and the most thoughtful.” — 
Baltimore Gazette. 

“ In this volume there is workman- 


$ 2 . 

ship of which none need be ashamed, 
while much vies with our best living 
writers. Strength and beauty, scholar¬ 
ship and fine intuition are manifested 
throughout so as to charm the readei 
and assure honorable distinction ^ 
the writer.. Such poetry is in no dangw* 
of becoming too abundant .”—PkU * 
delphia North A merican. 


Margaree. A Poem. By Hampden 

i6mo. Extra cloth. 75 cents. 


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